51 and a half million Italians are called to the polls next Sunday to participate in legislative elections that come after an electoral campaign carried out in the middle of summer. It is an anomaly in the country that is explained by the hasty end, last July, of the government led by Mario Draghi when the heterogeneous coalition that supported it was blown up. Below we offer you the eight keys to these elections, which can leave the right-wing Giorgia Meloni as the first woman to head an Executive in Italy.
What do the polls say?
All the polls predict a clear victory for the conservative bloc, led by Fratelli d’Italia (FdI, Brothers of Italy), the far-right party led by Giorgia Meloni, which would obtain around 25% of the vote. It is a giant step compared to the 4% it obtained in the last general elections, held in 2018. The other political forces in this coalition are Matteo Salvini’s League and Forza Italia, commanded by Silvio Berlusconi. They would respectively achieve 12% and 8% of the ballots, according to the polls. Together with other small parties, the Conservatives could win about half of the votes and, thanks to the effects of the electoral law, control two thirds of Parliament. If this result is confirmed, the next government would be right-wing and under the command of FdI, a political force allied with Vox.
Will Meloni be Prime Minister?
Although FdI’s victory is taken for granted, it is not so clear that the head of government will be Meloni. Whether a woman can hold the reins of power in Italy for the first time depends first on the balance reached by the right-wing coalition parties. The President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, to whom the Constitution grants the responsibility of appointing the Prime Minister and the rest of the members of his Cabinet, will also have a voice in the chapter. Mattarella will want guarantees that the next Executive does not threaten Italy’s international placement as a member of the European Union and NATO, among other aspects. The head of state has already shown signs in the past of his veto power by ruling out a possible economy minister for being against the euro. Very critical of Brussels, Meloni is an ally of the Eurosceptic leaders of Hungary and Poland.
Giorgia Meloni. /
Why could the extreme right win?
FdI embodied the only opposition to the previous government, led by Mario Draghi. During the last year and a half, Meloni managed in this way to monopolize media space and win the sympathy of all those dissatisfied with the Executive’s action. His political strength today represents the protest vote and has achieved a broad transfer of voters who previously chose the League or the 5-Star Movement; they join their historic core of far-right sympathizers. The FdI candidate has forged an image of herself as a tough and direct woman, capable of carrying out the reforms that the country needs to restore to Italians the pride of belonging to a nation that has been in decline for decades.
Why are the elections being held now?
The previous legislature should have ended naturally in the first quarter of 2023, but its end was hastened when, last July, the League, Forza Italia and the populist 5 Star Movement left the coalition that supported the Government of Mario Draghi, in power since February 2021. This Executive was supported by a very broad alliance of political forces that understood that the country was experiencing an emergency situation due to the pandemic. They considered that Draghi, former president of the European Central Bank, was the most appropriate figure to get Italy out of the health crisis and to invest the millionaire funds of the European Recovery Plan well.
Mario Draghi. /
Is Fratelli d’Italia a neo-fascist party?
Its leader, Meloni, affirms that in his political force “there is no fascist, racist or anti-Semitic nostalgia” and condemns the “infamous” laws against the Jews of the period in power of Benito Mussolini. Although he tries to present FdI as a modern and democratic conservative formation, on issues such as immigration he has a position that borders on xenophobia. The origin of his party, furthermore, is in the MSI, a movement founded by those nostalgic for the ‘Duce’ after the Second World War, and the controversial symbol of this formation, the so-called ‘tricolor flame’, is still present on the coat of arms of FdI. It is not surprising that episodes in which local leaders of this political force are discovered making the fascist salute are frequent.
Who would command the opposition?
Barring a last-minute surprise, the Democratic Party (PD), the main center-left force in the country, will be relegated to the opposition. The polls predict that it will achieve around 22% of the votes, a discreet result that is explained in part by the few passions that its leader, Enrico Letta, arouses. He was unsuccessful in trying to forge alliances with other parties, nor does his strategy of polarizing the campaign by presenting himself as the antithesis of Meloni seem to be working. The foreseeable defeat of the PD may lead to an internal reckoning from which a new leadership of the Italian left will emerge.
What other parties are there besides the two big blocs?
Although at first it valued presenting itself to the elections in alliance with the PD, finally the 5 Star Movement (M5E) concurs alone. Led by former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, this populist political force was the protagonist of the previous legislature: it was the largest in Parliament and participated in all three governments. The electoral campaign has not gone too badly for Conte with the demand for citizenship income, his star measure in the previous legislature, and could exceed 13% of the votes, despite the fact that he was considered dead a few months ago due to wear and tear in power, political contradictions and internal fights. The so-called Third Pole, formed by two small centrist parties, is also expected to obtain parliamentary representation with around 7% of the ballots.
What weight will abstention have?
-It is one of the great unknowns of these elections. It is estimated that more than 40% of voters still do not know who they will vote for or even if they will. According to experts, many of them will be decided in the last hours before going to the polls, so any promise or shocking news in the final stretch of the campaign could have a substantial impact on the results. Demobilization is greater among left-wing voters due to the poor prospects for their own and the fact that victory is discounted for the conservative bloc.
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