Left-wing strongholds no longer exist in Italy, Giorgia Meloni boasts

Giorgia Meloni boasted that there are no longer any “strongholds” of the Left in Italy after her Right-wing coalition triumphed in local elections.

The prime minister pointed to victories in towns and cities in regions such as Tuscany which for decades have been regarded as fiefdoms of the centre-Left.

The success provides evidence that Ms Meloni is still enjoying a honeymoon period with Italian voters, eight months after she became Italy’s first female prime minister and the first since the end of the Second World War to come from a party with fascist origins.

Her Brothers of Italy party traces its roots to the country’s post-war fascist movement but so far appears to have maintained a broad appeal for many voters.

‘United and credible’

One of the Right’s biggest achievements was to win the port city of Ancona in the central region of Marche after more than 30 years of centre-Left governance.

“We have obtained good results and some victories that could be defined as historic - as in Ancona,” Ms Meloni said in a video message. “Strongholds [of the Left] no longer exist.”

Right-wing candidates also took the cities of Massa Marittima, Pisa and Siena in Tuscany, long regarded as a staunchly “red” or Left-leaning region.

“Beyond all expectations, the coalition has shown itself to be united and credible,” said Antonio Tajani, Italy’s foreign minister and a heavyweight in Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party, a member of the coalition.

“The result in Ancona is historic – there’s never been a centre-Right mayor there.”

The centre-Left’s only significant win was in the city of Vicenza in northern Italy but the margin was tight – the Left’s candidate won 50.5 per cent of votes compared to the centre-Right’s 49.5 per cent.

“The Right wins everywhere – the Left only in Vicenza,” was the headline in the Left-leaning daily La Repubblica.

‘It’s a clear defeat’

Elly Schlein, the newly-elected leader of the centre-Left Democratic Party, conceded that its candidates had been routed.

“It’s a clear defeat. It shows that the winds that blew the Right to victory [in the autumn] are still strong,” she said.

It was hoped that Ms Schlein, a young, bisexual progressive who has been cast as the “anti-Meloni”, would breathe life into the Democratic Party.

Supporters pointed out that she was only appointed leader in February and so had not been responsible for picking the Left’s candidates.

Ms Schlein, who worked on the campaign trail for Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012, has promised to make the Democratic Party more radical, arguing that it has moved too far to the centre in recent years.

A strong supporter of LGBTQ+ rights, she is in a relationship with a woman.

‘Electoral catastrophe’

Antonio Rubino, an official with the Democratic Party, described the results as “an electoral catastrophe”.

Alessandro Alfieri, a senator from the party, said the centre-Right had managed to forge strong alliances but the centre-Left had failed to do the same with the populist Five Star Movement, which should be its natural ally.

Matteo Salvini, deputy prime minister and leader of the Right-wing League, a member of the coalition, mocked what he called the “Schlein effect”, saying she had failed to meet expectations.

He hailed the Right-wing coalition’s “extraordinary results” and “historic victories”. Its performance in Tuscany was a “triumph”, he said.

Ms Meloni has pursued a nativist, conservative agenda domestically since coming to power, promoting the idea of “traditional families” and targeting the right of gay couples to have children through surrogacy, provoking intense criticism.

But internationally she has largely soothed the concerns of allies by continuing the pro-West, pro-Nato stance of her predecessor, the former central banker Mario Draghi.

She has overridden the Russophile sympathies of her coalition partners, Mr Salvini and Mr Berlusconi, and has pledged firm support for Ukraine in its fight against Russia.