Long-delayed portraits of two Sinn Féin lord mayors who shared a term in office are to cost Belfast ratepayers almost £27,000.
MP John Finucane was lord mayor of the city in 2019 but following his election to Westminster, he was replaced in December that year by councillor Daniel Baker.
They are among three Sinn Féin former Belfast lord mayors whose portraits have yet to be unveiled years after their tenures came to an end.
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Belfast City Council is the only local authority in Northern Ireland which annually commissions painted portraits of its civic leaders.
More than £150,000 of ratepayers' cash has been spent on the portraits since 2005.
Public spending campaigners have previously branded such displays an "expensive vanity project", but the council has defended it is a tradition "popular with citizens and tourists alike".
Mr Finucane's portrait by Lia Davis is due to cost £12,000 and is scheduled to be completed in "spring 2022", the council said in a Freedom of Information response to Belfast Live.
Mr Baker's portrait by Tony Bell cost £14,950 and was completed in June last year - but there has been no council publicity to unveil the image.
This is despite the council in February formally unveiling the portrait of DUP councillor Frank McCoubrey, who was lord mayor for the year-long term after Mr Baker.
The council has yet to disclose the cost of Mr McCoubrey's portrait, painted by Co Antrim artist Stephen Johnston.
It comes amid continuing delays in the unveiling of a portrait of Sinn Féin Communities Minister Deirdre Hargey, who was the city's lord mayor in 2018-19.
The council had said the portrait was being created by artist Catherine Creaney, with a budget between £10,000 and £13,000.
It last year said there was an initial delay in commissioning Ms Hargey's portrait as "her artist of choice wasn't immediately free to accept the commission".
It added: "Progress was also disrupted given the ongoing pandemic, as well as former Lord Mayor Hargey's own personal circumstances."
Ms Hargey had to step aside as Stormont's Communities Minister for six months in 2020 after suffering liver failure and undergoing emergency surgery.
The council had last year said it hoped to unveil Ms Hargey's portrait "later in the year, when circumstances allow".
The local authority on Monday said all three outstanding portraits are due to be unveiled "this year".
A council spokesman said: "The portraits of former Lord Mayors of Belfast - Deirdre Hargey, Councillor Daniel Baker and John Finucane - are due to be unveiled this year.
"Commissioning artists to complete the works as well as the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic have contributed to the delay in the portraits being unveiled."
Of the 12 mayoral portraits completed between 2005 and 2018, the most expensive was of 2010-11 mayor Pat Convery – formerly of the SDLP before he quit the party – created by John Keane for £15,150.
Sinn Féin's Mr Baker has previously said mayoral portraiture is a "huge part of city hall" as it "tells a history and (is) popular for tours".
Last year he tweeted: "What I will say my portrait, a picture of my mum will be in it. She never got to see me as mayor, but will be in city hall forever."
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