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Centre-right leads in Sicily regional vote: exit polls

A rightwing coalition spearheaded by Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia was projected on Monday to have edged out the populist Five Star Movement in a closely watched regional election in Sicily, according to polling forecasts.

Published: 6 November 2017 08:59 CET
Updated: 6 November 2017 10:59 CET
Centre-right leads in Sicily regional vote: exit polls
A centre-right victory would be a huge boost for ex-PM Silvio Berlusconi, pictured at a rally. Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP

As counting got underway on Monday following the close of polling stations late on Sunday, the right's Nello Musumeci was projected to have 37.3 percent of the vote and the Five Star's Giancarlo Cancelleri 36.8 percent, the EMG polling institute calculated for La7 television.

The Piepoli institute, meanwhile, gave Musumeci 36 percent to Cancelleri's 34 percent, according to RAI television.

Final results are not expected until later on Monday, but the projections appear to confirm the expected loss for leftwing rivals, with the centre-left Democratic Party of former premier Matteo Renzi seen garnering 20 percent of the vote.

The Sicily vote is being watched as a barometer of public sentiment ahead of general election expected next year.

A new electoral system, voted in last month, favours alliances. If the results are confirmed, it would prove the power of a coalition made up of Forza Italia (Go Italy) and its rightist allies, the anti-immigrant Northern League and the Brothers of Italy. While the bloc is considered unlikely to be able to win an absolute majority on the national stage, snapping up the most votes would put it in control of any coalition it formed with the left.

Berlusconi, the four-time former premier who was declared politically dead after a series of scandals and open heart surgery last year, hopes a Sicily victory will launch him back in the centre-right driving seat.

One of his loudest challengers, comedian and M5S founder Beppe Grillo, had told Sicilians “the choice is simple: us or them, the future or the past, hope or failure, citizens or traditional parties”. As one of the poorest regions in Italy, Sicily has proven open to the anti-establishment M5S, which wooed many with a promise of establishing a basic universal income.

But it appeared voters may have been more convinced by Berlusconi's portrayal of himself as a pro-European moderate who represented the only real defence against populism. The League had seen Sicily as a testing ground for expanding its reach beyond Italy's northern regions.

A bitterly feuding left failed to get anywhere near the top, losing control of the island.

The only consolation for Renzi was that the MPD — a new party formed this year after the PD's far-left flank broke away — did less well than he feared, taking home between seven and 11 percent. The result could still spell bad news not just for the left nationally but also for the former PM, who wants his old job back.

“Renzi is preparing for the probable Sicilian nosedive like a man whose enemies are at the door and the supplies are running out,” political commentator Tommaso Ciriaco said.

The 42-year old has been accused of causing a debilitating rift in the left that may not be easily fixed.

Voter dissatisfaction in Sicily — where the rate of youth unemployment is nearly 60 percent — translated into a pitiful turnout. While only 47 percent of eligible voters cast their ballots in the last regional election in 2012, a record low, figures at 7pm on Sunday suggested even fewer had done so this year.

“The polling stations open under a dark cloud, amid controversy over the risk of vote-rigging,” La Repubblica daily said, referring to claims the decision to wait overnight before beginning the count increased the chances of fraud.

The interior ministry was tightening controls in the Mafia heartland in response, it said.

By Alessio Tricani with Ella Ide in Rome

READ ALSO: Italy's political system – ten key things to know

POLITICS

Can foreign residents in Italy vote in the European elections?

The year 2024 is a bumper one for elections, among them the European elections in June. Italy is of course a member of the EU - so can foreign residents vote in the elections that will almost certainly affect their daily lives?

Published: 3 May 2024 15:25 CEST
Can foreign residents in Italy vote in the European elections?

Across Europe, people will go to the polls in early June to select their representatives in the European Parliament, with 76 seats up for grabs in Italy. 

Although European elections usually see a much lower turnout than national elections, they are still seen as important by Italian politicians.

Giorgia Meloni will stand as a candidate this year, hoping use her personal popularity to give her Brothers of Italy party a boost and build on her success in Italy to “send the left into opposition” at the European level too.

When to vote

Across Italy, polling takes place on Saturday 8th and Sunday 9th June 2024.

Polling stations will be set up in the same places as for national and local elections – usually town halls, leisure centres and other public buildings.

You have to vote at the polling station for the municipality in which you are registered as a resident, which should be indicated on your electoral card.

Polling stations open at 8am and mostly close at 6pm, although some stay open later.

Unlike in presidential or local elections, there is only a single round of voting in European elections.

Who can vote? 

Italian citizens – including dual nationals – can vote in European elections, even if they don’t live in Italy. As is common for Italian domestic elections, polling booths will be set up in Italian consulates around the world to allow Italians living overseas to vote.

Non-Italian citizens who are living in Italy can only vote if they have citizenship of an EU country. So for example Irish citizens living in Italy can vote in European elections but Americans, Canadians, Australians, etc. cannot.

Brits in Italy used to be able to vote before Brexit, but now cannot – even if they have the post-Brexit carta di soggiorno.

If you have previously voted in an election in Italy – either local or European – you should still be on the electoral roll.

If not, in order to vote you need to send an application more than 90 days before the election date.

How does the election work?

The system for European elections differs from most countries’ domestic polls. MEPs are elected once every five years.

Each country is given an allocation of MEPs roughly based on population size. At present there are 705 MEPs: Germany – the country in the bloc with the largest population – has the most while the smallest number belong to Malta with just six.

Italy, like most of its EU neighbours, elects its MEPs through direct proportional representation via the ‘list’ system, so that parties gain the number of MEPs equivalent to their share of the overall vote.

So, for example, if Meloni’s party won 50 percent of the vote they would get 38 out of the total of 76 Italian seats.

Exactly who gets to be an MEP is decided in advance by the parties who publish their candidate lists in priority order. So let’s say that Meloni’s party does get that 50 percent of the vote – then the people named from 1 to 38 on their list get to be MEPs, and the people lower down on the list do not, unless a candidate (for example, Meloni) declines the seat and passes it on to the next person on the list.

In the run up to the election, the parties decide on who will be their lead candidates and these people will almost certainly be elected (though Meloni would almost definitely not take up her seat as an MEP, as this would mean resigning from office in Italy).

The further down the list a name appears, the less likely that person is to be heading to parliament.

Once in parliament, parties usually seek to maximise their influence by joining one of the ‘blocks’ made up of parties from neighbouring countries that broadly share their interests and values eg centre-left, far-right, green.

The parliament alternates between Strasbourg and Brussels. 

Find out more about voting in the European elections from Italy on the European Parliament’s website or the Italian interior ministry’s website.

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