Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK

POLITICS

Success for Italy’s rightwing parties in Abruzzo local elections

Italy’s rightwing coalition triumphed in Abruzzo’s local elections this weekend, handing the regional senator post to Brothers of Italy and giving a boost to the League.

Published: 11 February 2019 10:30 CET
Updated: 11 February 2019 16:12 CET
Success for Italy's rightwing parties in Abruzzo local elections
The leaders of Italy’s rightwing coalition at a press conference in Pescara, Abruzzo. (L-R): Italy’s Interior Minister and deputy PM, and leader of the League party Matteo Salvini; leader of Brothers

Italy's far-right League also triumphed over its Five Star Movement (M5S) coalition partner in a regional vote seen as a test of the parties’ strength.

The local election in Abruzzo, a region east of Rome, was the first in which M5S and the League have been pitted against each other since they formed their uneasy national government coalition last June.

A rightwing League-led alliance that included its old ally, former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia, took just over 48 percent of the vote, results showed this morning.

The post of Abruzzo regional senator went to the rightwing coalition’s candidate, far-right Brothers of Italy member Marco Marsilio, as predicted by polls ahead of the vote.

 The vote in the Abruzzo region laid bare the difficulties for the Five Star Movement (M5S), which was the country's leading party at last year's general election but has seen its popularity recede since taking power in an uneasy coalition with the League.

The anti-immigration League, led by hardline Interior Minister Matteo Salvini, won 28 percent in Abruzzo's local elections on Sunday, compared with 19 percent for M5S, the interior ministry said.

M5S candidate Sara Marcozzi said it was “not a defeat for M5S but for democracy”.

League leader Matteo Salvini. Photo: AFP

The regional vote is seen as a test of strength for both parties ahead of the European elections in May.

Success in the European polls would strengthen the League's hand further, with expectations that this would spur Salvini into “engineering” an early election in a bid to rule alone. 

While the M5S won 33 percent in the general election last year, far outstripping the League's 17 percent, it has since watched the rise of Salvini's party.

READ ALSO: Is Italy's League a 'far-right' party?

Both M5S head Luigi Di Maio and Salvini had campaigned heavily in the mountainous Abruzzo region ahead of the weekend vote.

The center-left, which has struggled to put up a united front against the populists, had a strong showing with 31 percent.

The League is now favoured by 34 percent of Italian voters, according to an Ipsos poll released today. 

Salvini was accused of violating election laws after he posted a tweet on election day asking people in Abruzzo to vote for the League.

No campaigning is allowed the day before the election and while the polls are still open, according to Italian electoral law. As Interior Minister, Salvini is the one responsible for ensuring that this law is followed.

READ ALSO: Matteo Salvini, Italy's rebranded nationalist sharing power with former enemy

Member comments

Log in here to leave a comment.
Become a Member to leave a comment.

POLITICS

‘Worrying developments’: NGOs warn of growing pressure on Italian media freedom

Media freedom in Italy has come increasingly under pressure since Giorgia Meloni's hard-right government took office, a group of European NGOs warned on Friday following an urgent fact-finding summit.

Published: 17 May 2024 17:40 CEST
‘Worrying developments’: NGOs warn of growing pressure on Italian media freedom

They highlighted among their concerns the continued criminalisation of defamation – a law Meloni herself has used against a high-profile journalist – and the proposed takeover of a major news agency by a right-wing MP.

The two-day mission, led by the European Federation of Journalists (EFJ), was planned for the autumn but brought forward due to “worrying developments”, Andreas Lamm of the European Centre for Press and Media Freedom (ECPMF) told a press conference.

The ECPMF’s monitoring project, which records incidents affecting media freedom such as legal action, editorial interference and physical attacks, recorded a spike in Italy’s numbers from 46 in 2022 to 80 in 2023.

There have been 49 so far this year.

Meloni, the leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party, took office as head of a hard-right coalition government in October 2022.

A key concern of the NGOs is the increased political influence over the RAI public broadcaster, which triggered a strike by its journalists this month.

READ ALSO: Italy’s press freedom ranking drops amid fears of government ‘censorship’

“We know RAI was always politicised…but now we are at another level,” said Renate Schroeder, director of the Brussels-based EFJ.

The NGO representatives – who will write up a formal report in the coming weeks – recommended the appointment of fully independent directors to RAI, among other measures.

They also raised concerns about the failure of repeated Italian governments to decriminalise defamation, despite calls for reform by the country’s Constitutional Court.

Meloni herself successfully sued journalist Roberto Saviano last year for criticising her attitude to migrants.

“In a European democracy a prime minister does not respond to criticism by legally intimidating writers like Saviano,” said David Diaz-Jogeix of London-based Article 19.

He said that a proposed reform being debated in parliament, which would replace imprisonment with fines of up to 50,000 euros, “does not meet the bare minimum of international and European standards of freedom of expression”.

The experts also warned about the mooted takeover of the AGI news agency by a group owned by a member of parliament with Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini’s far-right League party – a proposal that also triggered journalist strikes.

READ ALSO: How much control does Giorgia Meloni’s government have over Italian media?

Beatrice Chioccioli of the International Press Institute said it posed a “significant risk for the editorial independence” of the agency.

The so-called Media Freedom Rapid Response (MFRR) consortium expressed disappointment that no member of Meloni’s coalition responded to requests to meet with them.

They said that, as things stand, Italy is likely to be in breach of a new EU media freedom law, introduced partly because of fears of deteriorating standards in countries such as Hungary and Poland.

Schroeder said next month’s European Parliament elections could be a “turning point”, warning that an increase in power of the far-right across the bloc “will have an influence also on media freedom”.

SHOW COMMENTS