«From here, let’s be clear, the Democratic Party will work to build a coalition that beats the right and wins the regional elections». He solves it directly from his crowded Genoese stage, Elly Schleinthe underlying misunderstanding of his day in Liguria and of the (lively, by contingency and vocation) debate within the party.
Having passed in ten hours from Rapallo to Genoa, from conferences between entrepreneurs to pride villages, alongside the national secretary in front of the crowd of Calata Mandraccio are all the Ligurian dem Eurocandidates, Cecilia Strada, Brando Benifei And Donatella Alfonso in the front row, with European themes and flags in the background.
Too important to reach the 20 percent threshold, which not all polls put safe: a week before the vote on 8 and 9 June, “every vote counts”, is the message of every Dem meeting. What fills the square, however, chosen “courageously” among the largest among those available, seems to be also and above all the more distant horizon, those early regional elections which the judicial earthquake that struck the Ligurian governor Giovanni Toti probably made inevitable.
Among the hundreds who crowd the Mandraccio, that is the first thought. «It was the right time to hold the two challenges together», Schlein herself will say under the stage after the events, among the usual selfies. And so the title to the square ends up being given mainly by the local dem secretaries, Simone D’Angelo And Davide Natalein their speech from the stage overlooking the sea: «This is the eviction notice for Toti and the right».
Landed in Liguria also to try to calm down if not reconcile a local party that is unable to free itself from its usual vices, – certain tight smiles from yesterday still tell of tensions and divisions in series, between new and old seasons of the same world, between squares and chat – Schlein had already sent his message on the Ligurian scandal in recent days.
«The judiciary will take its course, but there is one thing that comes first, when there is such a serious picture that emerges from the investigations: it is the political opportunity to let Liguria turn the page and start again, go to new elections”, he reiterates the request for Toti’s resignation from the stage. «We were taught that those elected in the institutions govern for everyone, not just for those who voted for them. And they also taught us that before personal destiny comes the meaning of the institutions and the dignity of the institutions: this is why we say that Toti must resign, or rather that he should have already resigned”, is the alarm shared by all the dem leaders.
For the first time, however, waiting for the “battle” on the no-confidence that the group leader in the Region Luca Garibaldi promises for Tuesday, for the Regional Council of no confidence in the suspended governor, the national leader herself tries to chart the course. Speaking of a broad coalition with which to share the construction of the proposal, of the role of the Democratic Party in driving the front, of a party – it is also relaunched by the minority of the party, there are also parliamentarians in the audience Annamaria Furlan And Lorenzo Basso – «that he is ready to govern».
«The event to focus on is the European Championships in a week, – is the indirect reply of the regional councilor Armando Sanna – We have been preparing for the Regionals for five years.” And it matters little that he isn’t among the many in the Porto Antico Andrea Orlandofor everyone the candidate in pectore of the party, if there are regional elections.
An absence that is noticed, it couldn’t do otherwise, but no one cares to point it out. The former minister is in Milan, to present the book by Goffredo Bettini and hold a “technical” meeting for the European Championships, and in the square there are those who quote Nanni Moretti to joke about it: “Do you notice me more if I come and stay on the sidelines or if I don’t come at all?”. Better, perhaps, to avoid excessive impulses towards a future yet to be defined.
Even among the rediscovered people of the party, who haven’t seen such a participatory square for a long time, there is the air of a charging pace. Little desire to comment on the consequences of the investigation that shook a region on the Democratic Party itself, the underlying message is the request for a relaunch. «Let’s get rid of this business center-right, let’s get rid of this politics, of the governors who decide our future over lunch on yachts, – an old militant clinging to the stage set up overlooking the pier vents, perhaps not by chance – This is the opportunity to turn page once and for all for real, even among ourselves, let’s put a stop to the past and let’s go and take back this region.” Free words even applauded by the neighbors at the rally, awaiting the arrival (late, as often happens) of the secretary.
In short, it is the uncertain fate of the region that inflames the electorate of a political force that has been racking up defeats for almost ten years now. «On the right they are always double standards, only a few weeks ago they were asking for resignations for the investigations which had not even touched the president of the Puglia Region, now they have all become guaranteeists and we have seen ministers acting as court-appointed lawyers», unleashes Piazza Schlein, highly applauded by those he defines as “great friends”, Sergio Cofferati And Luca Pastorino, both dems returning with the new direction of the party.
The final stage of a race of “still 150 events” is next Friday, however, for the closing rally of the campaign that the national secretary of the Democratic Party wanted in Padua, among the pride events and the memory of Enrico Berlinguer. «There are the European elections, and everything that we as a party community must bring to Europe”, recalls Schlein, and resumes the pattern of recent months with the usual themes to be explored, from the collection of signatures for the minimum wage to the collapse of healthcare, from the plans Valditara of reducing the quotas of foreigners in classes to the dem’s self-criticism on the Ius Soli (“a law that we didn’t make when we had the numbers to make it”). And the government (and Giorgia Meloni above all) as the ideal target.
«We don’t make much of a female prime minister who doesn’t fight for the rights of other women in the country, starting with those to choose over her own body, because it’s shameful that the only concrete thing done by the Meloni government on healthcare is to anti-abortionists enter the clinics”, shouts the secretary. And again: «We will not allow anyone to rewrite our history, I say this to Meloni, guest of Vox: we are very proud of our anti-fascist identity».
Many useful memos as if to reiterate that yes, the party’s horizon can only be Europe, but above all the new political phase that will open from 10 June, in the country and partly also in Liguria. «The Ligurian affair has affected the electoral campaign at all levels, and even more so here – Benifei reflects backstage, after the event is over – But with the elections now close, the issues have been reconciled. At stake are the fate of a better Europe, and a different future for a region that has been condemned for this decline by a right incapable of working from a European perspective. In the end, things come together.”
