Political leader of the Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni.
Marco Cantell | Light Rocket | Getty Images
Italians are on their way to electing the country’s first female prime minister and the first far-right government since the end of World War II.
The Giorgia Meloni (Brothers of Italy) party is set to receive 22.5% to 26.5% of the vote, according to an opinion poll on Sunday. The party is in a broad right-wing alliance with Lega, led by Matteo Salvini, Forza Italia led by Silvio Berlusconi, and a secondary coalition partner, Noi Modrati.
This alliance is set to win 41% to 45% of the vote, according to opinion polls, which is enough to get a parliamentary majority with the center-left bloc at 22.5% against 26.5%. Early predictions of actual election results are due Monday morning.
Reaching political consensus and consolidating the coalition could take weeks and a new government could only come to power in October. But the vote could represent a major political shift for a pivotal European country dealing with ongoing economic and political instability.
Melonii’s Brothers of Italy Party was created in 2012, but its roots go back to the neo-fascist movement in Italy in the 20th century that emerged after the death of fascist leader Benito Mussolini in 1945. Melonii’s 2019 speech helped her become a household name when she was DJ is unsuspecting. She remixed her lyrics (“I’m Georgia, I’m a woman, I’m a mother, I’m Italian, I’m a Christian”) into a dance music track, which went viral.
After winning 4% of the vote in the 2018 election, brothers Italia and 45-year-old Meloni used their oppositional position to launch into the mainstream. Meloni has taken great measures to appeal to a more moderate, center-right majority in Italian society and She claims to rid her party of fascist elements.
The incumbent, Mario Draghi, a much-loved technocrat who was forced to step down due to political infighting in July, remains in power and plays a temporary role. Sunday’s snap elections in the European Union’s third-largest economy come six months early.
Elections are being closely watched in Brussels as the European region grapples with the war in Ukraine, an energy crisis and spiraling inflation. The brothers of Italy expressed their opposition to euroBut she advocates reforming the EU in order to make it less bureaucratic and less influential in domestic politics.
On the economic level, he deferred to the position of the center-right coalition that the next government should cut sales taxes on certain goods to alleviate the cost-of-living crisis, and said that Italy should renegotiate the Covid-19 recovery funds with the European Union. The party was pro-NATO, pro-Ukrainian, and supported anti-Russian sanctions.
Center-left politicians fear that relations with the rest of Europe will change under a Meloni government. Enrico Letta, the head of the Democratic Party, told CNBC earlier this month that Italy has two options when it comes to Europe – staying in the top tier of economies and governance, or “landing”.
″[The] The first option is to maintain our position in “First Class”. First class means Brussels, Germany, France, Spain, major European countries and founders like us. [The] The second option is relegation to the second division with Poland and Hungary, and he decided to stay with them against Brussels, against Berlin, against Paris and Madrid.”
“I think it would be a disaster for Italy to choose the second division,” he said.
– CNBC’s Holly Eliat contributed to this article.
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