Michelle O’Neill shares video from ‘home place of Cork’ days before election

Sinn Féin’s two most senior figures have left their offices in Dublin and Belfast for the streets of Cork today as they make a push for votes with less than a week to go before the local and European elections.

Mary Lou McDonald and Michelle O’Neill shared a video on social media of the two getting ready to hit the campaign trail as they hope to use their high profiles to boost their candidates chances in Friday’s elections.

The party has recently hit a wobble in the opinion polls after holding on to a sizeable lead against their political rivals for the last four years – the recently leveled playing field means that this final week of campaigning will be crucial to all parties.

O’Neill is a proud Tyrone woman but was originally born in the East Cork village of Fermoy in 1977. Standing alongside party president Mary Lou McDonald today, she told potential voters: “I’m so proud of my Cork roots”.

As Vice President of Sinn Féin, she was already a well-known politician but she made international headlines earlier this year when she became the first nationalist to ever hold the office of First Minister of Northern Ireland.

Since then, she and the DUP’s Emma Little-Pengelly, Deputy First Minister, have been lauded for their willingness to work together after the North went two years without a Government.

When the two politicians visited Washington DC earlier this year, US President Joe Biden told them: “Thank you for reminding us what the possibilities are for working across the aisle and rising above long standing disagreements.”

With a poor result in the 2019 local and EU elections, the party has no sitting MEPs in Munster and a relatively small team of city and county councillors. The party will be hoping that the two ‘top dogs’ will be enough to convince the Cork electorate to vote for their candidates on Friday.