Polish activists are calling on Ireland’s largest minority to make sure they register to vote for next summer’s local elections.
The Vote! You Are At Home campaign, which was launched recently by the Ireland-based Forum Polonia and the School for Leaders Association based in Warsaw, seeks to encourage Polish people here to sign up with their local authorities by 25 November, the deadline for putting new names on the register.
Campaign co-ordinator Barnaba Dorda said he wants Polish people in Ireland to be not only part of the country’s economic landscape in businesses, shops, and factories, but also part of the political scene.
Non-partisan campaign
“We believe that the Polish community should be integrated with Irish society. We are now side-by-side with the Irish, working together to improve the country at the local level,” he said.
The new campaign is not about telling people who to vote for in the local elections that come around in May next year, Dorda said.
“This is a non-partisan campaign. We want to prompt people to register and find a local councillor who answers their needs, they might be Irish, might be Nigerian, might be Polish.”
Organisers decided to target the 122,000-strong Polish community as they felt they knew what would chime best with this particular group.
But their new website at YouAreAtHome.org – which provides details of who can vote, how to register, and what exactly local councillors do – is available in both English and Polish to make it accessible to others who might be interested.
While non-Irish and non-British citizens are not allowed to vote in elections for the Dáil, all Irish residents, regardless of whether or not they have Irish citizenship, can vote in local elections if they register, said Dorda.
EU nationals, meanwhile, can also vote in the European Parliament elections which are also scheduled for May 2014, and the campaign will be encouraging people to vote in those too, he added.
The Polish voting campaign is part of a larger push to encourage migrants to get involved in Ireland’s local politics.
