Irish voters gear up for an election on Friday in which Prime Minister Brian Cowen's ruling Fianna Fail party, which has dominated Irish politics for decades, is expected to be overwhelmingly rejected by voters, AFP reports.
Prime Minister Brian Cowen called the vote early after accepting an 85 billion euro (AUD$116 billion) bail-out from the EU and IMF in November.
The country now holds a budget deficit of 32% of gross domestic product, and Cowen is not standing for re-election.
As the BBC reports, the new government will have to deal with rebuilding the Irish economy, once known as the Celtic Tiger for its strong growth, but now in a slump after the crash of its property market and the near-collapse of several of its banks.
AFP reports that the country on Thursday transferred more than 12 billion euros (AUD $16.5 billion) of deposits from two of its crisis-hit banks to rival institutions, part of efforts to secure the bailout.
The High Court ordered that customers and their money be moved from Anglo Irish Bank and Irish Nationwide Building Society (INBS) to Allied Irish Banks (AIB) and Irish Life & Permanent respectively, said the finance ministry in a statement.
"This is a decisive step towards resolving the position of Anglo and INBS in a way that protects depositors and strengthens the banking system," said Finance Minister Brian Lenihan.
The move is a step towards winding down the two banks, who have been accused of reckless lending, leading to the inflation and collapse of a property bubble in Ireland which plunged the country into a deep recession.
Restructuring of the banking sector is part of conditions attached to huge loans from the European Union and International Monetary Fund, which form the lion's share of an 85-billion-euro rescue package for Ireland.
Dublin was pushed into accepting the package in November as its economy teetered, making it the second eurozone country to accept a bailout after Greece.
Anglo Irish was nationalised in January 2009, while INBS and AIB were also placed under state control last year. IL&P is the last major Irish financial institution not to have been rescued by the state.
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