A Italy registered a record abstention in the European elections in the country, the first in the history of the Republic in which less than 50% of voters eligible to vote went to the polls, despite the dispute bringing together many party leaders.
According to final data released this Monday (10) by the Italian Ministry of the Interior, participation in the election held over the two days of last weekend was 49,69%.
The number means that, for the first time in an election in the European Union (EU), less than half of the Italian electorate exercised their right to vote.
Italy's turnout in the 2019 European elections was 54,5%.
Considering only the voters and looking not at the absolute votes, but at the percentages, the three government parties see their numbers reinforced, which together total around 48%, with a clear lead from the far-right party of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni , Brothers of Italy (FdI), which received 28% of the votes.
The center-left Democratic Party (PD), led by Elly Schlein, was also rewarded, growing in terms of policies both in terms of absolute and percentage votes (24%), as was the Left Green Alliance (AVS) which rose to 6,6%.
On the other hand, the result of the 5 Star Movement (M5S) is “disappointing”, as admitted by former Italian Prime Minister and party leader Giuseppe Conte, falling below the 10% threshold.
The entry into the field of many leaders, such as Meloni, Schlein and the Vice Prime Minister of Italy, Antonio Tajani, and the radical tone of the campaign of some parties did not convince voters to go to the polls.
The 49,69% turnout is lower than the 63,9% in the September 2022 elections and the 56,09% in 2019. And this, despite the vote in 3,7 thousand municipalities and in the Piedmont region, which increased participation, which occurred in parallel.
In fact, the highest participation is recorded in the Northwest constituency, with 55,09%, while the lowest is in the South (48,32%) and in the Islands (37,20%), that is, the “area ” of M5S, which drops to 9,95%, when the seats counted are 59.993 out of 61.650.
Meloni smiles: the FdI, despite losing 800 thousand votes in relation to policies, stands at 28,8%, with a delegation of more than 20 MEPs, one of the strongest in Strasbourg.
In percentage terms, the coalition partners, Tajani's conservative Força Italia (FI), and Matteo Salvini's ultranationalist League, registered 9,72% and 9,12%, respectively.
The three parties together are close to 48%, which allows Meloni to highlight that in the next G7 the Italian government is the strongest, compared to “the mistreated” executives from Germany, France and the United Kingdom.
The vote in Italy polarized both sides, given that even among the opposition the PD is largely the first party with more than 24% and more than 100 more votes than in political elections.
This represents a success for Schlein, who reiterated his “spirit of unity” to guide the birth of a competitive coalition with the center-right.
Furthermore, the election also showed that there was a greater shift to the left thanks to the advance of AVS, which went from one million votes in 2022 to 1,5 million yesterday, with a percentage of 6,6%.
However, neither Stati Uniti d'Europa (3,75%) nor Carlo Calenda's Ação (3,31%) exceeded the 4% threshold needed to send elected representatives to Strasbourg. (HANDLE)
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