Elections in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, polling stations open. All the challenges of voting – Corriere.it

Ballot boxes open from 7 in Friuli Venezia Giulia, for voting to elect the president of the Region and renew the Council. And in 24 municipalities, including Udine, to elect the mayor and the municipal assemblies (a total of 1 million and 100 thousand voters). Four presidential candidates, with 13 support lists. Today we vote until 11pm, tomorrow from 7am to 3pm. The counting of ballots for the Region begins immediately after, followed by that of the Municipalities. But what is the meaning of the vote? different depending on the sides on the field. Let’s analyze them one by one, starting from the Region and then focusing on Udine.

Let’s start with who governed Friuli-Venezia Giulia in the last five years. With the outgoing governor Massimiliano Fedriga the center-right is deployed compactly: Forza Italia, Fratelli d’Italia and Lega, in addition to the Fedriga President and Autonomy responsible lists. Since the forecasts on the eve give the president’s confirmation as highly probable, almost certain, the match being played between Trieste, Udine, Gorizia and Pordenone is all political. And it concerns the balance of power within the centre-right. Compared to 2018, the scenario has completely changed. If we compare the data of five years ago with those of the Politics of last September, we note that the Brothers of Italy went from 5.5 to 31.3% while, on the contrary, the League which dominated with 34.9 dropped to 10.9. Forza Italia, in turn, passed from 21.1 to 6.7%. The balance of power therefore reversed in favor of the Prime Minister’s party. This is why it will be important to check how many votes the list bearing Fedriga’s name will gather, put in place precisely to broaden the consensus. The goal is to achieve the consensus of FdI with the sum of the votes of the Fedriga List and those of the League. To arrive at a junta that is not unbalanced on one side or the other.

On the other front, the Democratic Party and the 5 Star Movement have found an agreement (event still quite rare in electoral competitions) to give support to an autonomous candidate, Massimo Moretuzzo. In this field, eyes are focused above all on the result that the party that for a few weeks has been led by will obtain Elly Schlein. In the 2018-2022 comparison, the Democratic Party moved slightly: it went from 18 to 18.4%. Now the observers want to verify whether the enthusiasm that has ignited around the new secretary (who has obtained the greatest number of votes in the internal battle in Trieste) will have positive effects in the polls. The goal is to hit at least 20%. For the 5 Stars the most precarious situation. Stationary at 7%, they fear discounting the lack of appeal of local elections and falling to 4-5%.

There are two other candidates on the field for the Regionals. The Third Pole, opposite to the Pd-M5S agreement, he decided to run alone and does so by giving support to Alexander Maran, already a long-term parliamentarian (4 legislatures), raised in the PCI, then PDS and DS, then Pd but with a passage in Civic Choice, a return to the Democratic Party and a final landing with the Calendian-Renzians. Finally, here Georgia Tripoliin her first political experience, candidate of “Insieme Liberi”, a point of reference for Italexit for Italy, Movimento 3V, Gilet Arancioni, Popolo della Famiglia and the UniUd Committee against the Green Pass.

The other important battle concerns the Municipality of Udine where the mayor outgoing Northern League Peter Fontanini, elected in 2018 with a margin of 230 votes, seeks reconfirmation relying on the solid support of the entire centre-right. There are three challengers, with the particularity that in this case the M5S has chosen to go alone with two civic lists (candidating Ivano Marchiol) and the Democratic Party allied itself with the third pole by presenting Happy DeToni. In the end Stefano Salme’ the representative of Free electors-I love Udine.