An alliance of far-right parties, led by Giorgia Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party — whose origins lie in postwar fascism — were on course to win between 41 and 45 percent of the vote in Sunday’s general elections, according to data from the Rai Piepoli exit poll.
The ultra-conservative Brothers of Italy party looks set to win between 22 and 26 percent of the vote, with coalition partners the League, led by Matteo Salvini, taking between 8.5 and 12.5 percent and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia between 6 and 8% of the vote. the vow.
As leader of the far-right coalition, Meloni will now become Italy’s first female prime minister. Final results are expected early Monday.
Meloni’s party has seen an astronomical rise in popularity in recent years, with just 4.5% of the vote in the last election, in 2018.
His popularity underscores Italy’s long-standing rejection of mainstream politics, seen most recently with the country’s support for anti-establishment parties such as the Five Star Movement and Salvini’s League.
Celebrating early results on Sunday evening, Salvini said on Twitter: “The center right with a clear lead in both the House and the Senate! It’s going to be a long night, but now I want to say THANK YOU.”
Meloni, a 45-year-old mother from Rome who has campaigned under the slogan “God, country and family”, leads a party whose agenda is rooted in Euroscepticism, anti-immigration policies and one that has also proposed reduce LGBTQ and abortion. rights
The center-left coalition, led by the left-wing Democratic Party and the centrist +Europe party, will win between 25.5% and 29.5% of the vote, while former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte’s bid to reactivate the Movement Five Stars it seemed to have been. he was unsuccessful, getting only 14-17% of the vote.
The Democratic Party conceded defeat early Monday morning, calling the results a “sad night for the country.”
“Without a doubt, we cannot, in view of the data seen so far, not attribute the victory to the right led by Giorgia Meloni. It is a sad afternoon for the country,” Debora Serracchiani, of the Democratic Party, told reporters.
Sunday’s snap national election was triggered by party infighting that saw the collapse of Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s government in July.
Voters headed to the polls amid a raft of new regulations, with voting hours also contained to one day instead of two.
Other changes included a younger voting age for the Senate and a reduction in the number of seats up for election, from 685 to 400 in the Senate and from 315 to 200 in the Lower House of Parliament. It is expected that this parliament will meet on October 13, when the head of state will ask the party leaders to decide on the form of the new government.
The run-up to the election was dominated by hot-button issues including Italy’s cost-of-living crisis, a €209bn package from the European Covid-19 recovery fund and the country’s support for Ukraine.
However, Meloni differs from coalition leaders Berlusconi and Salvini on a number of issues, including Ukraine, and has no connection to Russian President Vladimir Putin, unlike the pair, who have said they would like to review the sanctions against Russia for their impact on the Italian economy. Meloni has been steadfast in his support for the defense of Ukraine.
The new prime minister, the sixth in just eight years, will be tasked with addressing these challenges, with rising energy costs and economic uncertainty among the country’s most pressing.
And while Meloni is slated to make history as Italy’s first female prime minister, her politics don’t mean she’s necessarily interested in promoting women’s rights.
Emiliana De Blasio, diversity and inclusion adviser at LUISS University in Rome told CNN that Meloni “doesn’t raise any questions about women’s rights and empowerment in general.”
Sunday’s results come as other far-right parties in other European countries have marked recent gains, including the rise of Sweden’s anti-immigration Sweden Democrats, a party with neo-Nazi roots, which is expected to play a major role in the new government after winning the second largest share of seats in a general election earlier this month.
And in France, as far-right ideologue Marine Le Pen lost the French presidential election to Emmanuel Macron in April, her share of the popular vote shifted the French political center dramatically to the right.