Every opinion poll has pointed to approval when the ballots are counted tomorrow in both Northern Ireland and the neighbouring Irish Republic, where voters were being asked to drop their country's constitutional claim to the British-ruled north as part of the historic agreement.

Majority ``yes'' votes in both parts of Ireland would clear the way for implementation of the agreement on Northern Ireland's future. It was struck April 10 by the British and Irish governments and eight northern parties.The agreement calls for an election June 25 in Northern Ireland to select a 108-member Belfast Legislature from which a 12-member administration would be drawn. Decisions would require both Protestant and Catholic support.

Polls project that the Irish Republic's 2.7 million voters will easily endorse anagreement that won't affect their daily lives much. But up north, the outcome among 1.2 million registered voters looks closer -- most pivotally within the province's Protestant majority.

Many Protestants reject the entire deal on the grounds it would give IRA-allied Sinn Fein a role in the new Belfast government and allow early paroles for imprisoned members of the Irish Republican Army, which has observed a truce since July 1997.

Ulster Unionist leader David Trimble, who has seen party colleagues defect to a vociferous ``no'' camp led by two other Protestant parties, took on one of his most damaging critics in a final pre-vote debate last night on the BBC.