Several leaders of the League call for the resignation of their leader for achieving only 8% of the votes in last Sunday’s elections in Italy
Giorgia Meloni and Matteo Salvini have never liked each other. Although their parties, Fratelli d’Italia (FdI, Brothers of Italy) and the League, are part of the conservative alliance that won Sunday’s elections and to which Forza Italia also belongs, the formation of Silvio Berlusconi, Meloni and Salvini know that they have in the other their biggest rival. Its two political forces compete for the right-wing vote, so the growth of one is largely at the expense of the other. This is what has happened in the recent elections: FdI obtained 26%, 22 points more than in the previous elections, held in 2018, while the League remained at 8% compared to 17% four years ago.
The new balance of powers between the members of the conservative bloc, which also affects Forza Italia, going from 14% in 2018 to 8% on Sunday, will be reflected in the composition of the next government. The three parties have already begun the tug-of-war to choose the names of the new Executive. It is taken for granted that the prime minister will be Meloni, but it is not at all clear at the moment who will be in charge of the weighty portfolios, such as the Economy, Defense, Foreign Affairs or Interior.
It seems that it will not be possible for Salvini to win this last one, as he expected, due to the poor results of the League. The FdI leader will also want to avoid internal competition that could make her take charge of migration policy, one of the hot topics for both parties. Salvini’s continuity as head of the list of his formation, moreover, is not even assured, since some voices from his party are already openly calling for his resignation.
“An extraordinary congress of the League is needed. I would know who to choose as the new secretary, but, for now, I am not saying names,” said Roberto Maroni, a veteran leader and former regional president of Lombardy. Salvini’s predecessor, Umberto Bossi, warned on his part that “the people of the north have expressed a clear message and it has to be heard.” Bossi never agreed with his successor’s strategy of ceasing to be a northern regionalist party to become a national sovereignist force.
No re-election
The best symbol of the debacle suffered by the League, which has seen FdI double its number of votes in the northern regions, Salvini’s historic stronghold, is the fact that Bossi has not been re-elected: he thus leaves Parliament 35 years after the first time he held a seat. Salvini now intends to appoint him senator for life, but it seems very difficult for him to achieve it.
Giuseppe Leoni, co-founder of the League, considered it a “national shame” that Bossi had not been re-elected and blamed Salvini for having forgotten the party’s roots in the north of the country. The leader justified himself by acknowledging that he is not satisfied with the result, which he attributed to the presence of his formation in the heterogeneous coalition that supported the government of the outgoing Prime Minister, Mario Draghi.
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