ROME –
The electoral alliance of far-right leader Giorgia Meloni appeared to have a wide lead in Italy’s national vote, an exit poll on state television suggested on Sunday night after a record turnout.
State broadcaster Rai said Meloni’s Brothers of Italy, in alliance with two right-wing parties, appeared on track to win 45 percent of the vote in both houses of parliament. The closest contender appeared to be former Democratic Party Prime Minister Enrico Letta’s center-left alliance, which according to the exit poll polled as high as 29.5 percent. Rai said the poll had a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.
Meloni, 45, would be well positioned to become Italy’s first far-right prime minister since the end of World War II and the first woman in the country to hold that post. Her party, with neo-fascist roots, would need to form a coalition with her main allies, the League’s anti-immigrant leader Matteo Salvini and former conservative Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to achieve a solid majority in parliament.
Meloni’s meteoric rise in the European Union’s third-largest economy comes at a critical time, as much of the continent reels under soaring energy bills, a fallout from the war in Ukraine, and the determination of the West. to stand united against Russian aggression is being put to the test.
The same exit poll indicated that Meloni’s party appeared to have won between 22 and 26 percent of the vote, while Letta’s center-left Democrats appeared on track to win between 17 and 21 percent.
The counting of paper ballots began immediately after the polls closed and is expected to last well into Monday morning.
It could be weeks before Italy has a new coalition government assembled and sworn in.
More than a third of the 50.9 million eligible voters boycotted the vote. The final turnout was 64 percent, according to the Interior Ministry. That is much lower than the previous record for low turnout, 73 percent in the last election in 2018.
Meloni had no immediate comment after the exit poll was announced on state television RAI. But before that, he tweeted to Italian voters: “Today you can help write history.”
Meloni’s party grew out of the legacy of a neo-fascist party formed shortly after the war by those nostalgic for fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.
Italy’s complex electoral law rewards campaign alliance. Meloni was encouraged to participate in the vote by joining campaign forces with two admirers of Russian President Vladimir Putin: Salvini and Berlusconi. She herself is a strong advocate of supplying weapons to Ukraine to defend against attacks launched by Russia.
Democrats came into the vote at a huge disadvantage as they failed to secure an equally broad alliance with left-wing populists and centrists.
Italy has had three coalition governments since the last election, each led by someone who had not run for office, and that seemed to have alienated many voters, pollsters said.
“I hope we see honest people, and this is very difficult today,” Adriana Gherdo said at a polling station in Rome.
The kind of government the eurozone’s third-largest economy might have was being closely watched in Europe, given Meloni’s criticism of “Brussels bureaucrats” and his links to other right-wing leaders. He recently defended Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orban after the European Commission recommended suspending billions of euros in funding for Hungary over concerns about democratic backsliding and possible mismanagement of EU money.
Sunday’s elections were held six months earlier after Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s pandemic unity government, which enjoyed wide popularity among citizens, collapsed in late July.
But all three populist parties in his coalition boycotted a confidence vote linked to an energy relief measure. Its leaders — Salvini, Berlusconi and 5-Star Movement leader Giuseppe Conte, a former prime minister whose party is the largest in the outgoing parliament — saw Meloni’s popularity rise while theirs fell.
Meloni kept his Brothers of Italy party in opposition, refusing to join Draghi’s unity government or the two Conte coalitions that governed after the 2018 vote.
Italian businesses and households are struggling to pay gas and electricity bills, which in some cases are 10 times higher than last year.
Draghi remains interim until a new government is sworn in.