The two reforms of the centre-right, premiership and autonomy, take a step forward towards approval, but in a climate of high tension, which culminates with a brawl in the Chamber with a Five Star MP perhaps hit by a Northern League member and taken out of the Chamber in wheelchair.
That nerves are on edge can be understood when the Northern League deputy Domenico Furgiuele makes the X Mas sign while addressing the opposition benches who show off the tricolor and sing ‘Bella ciao’. A preview of what will happen shortly afterwards: MP Donno tries to deliver a tricolor to Minister Calderoli who is immediately ‘protected’ by his party colleagues. And a huge brawl breaks out immediately, which is barely subdued by the shop assistants. The one who paid the price was Leonardo Donno himself, who ended up on the ground and was also surrounded by other parliamentarians from the majority. An impressive clash whose images have circulated on the web. “You won’t pass, shame on you” said Giuseppe Conte, while Alessandra Maiorino spoke of “squad violence”.
Once calm returns, mutual accusations begin. Donno announces that he is fine after an electrocardiogram, explaining the dynamics: “I took a punch that grazed my face from deputy Iezzi, others tried like Mollicone, Candiani. Then many others arrived, the shop assistants…. I am collapsed, I felt pain in my chest and I struggled to breathe.” The Northern League member Iezzi, however, denies it but not completely: “I tried to punch him, but I didn’t hit him. Donno tried to attack Calderoli and I reacted. I move away and then he falls like a pear. His act should be condemned “. The truth is now being examined by the President of the Chamber Lorenzo Fontana: the videos have been acquired and the session obviously suspended. “It is not possible to resume work in this climate of growing verbal and even physical violence”, the secretary of the Democratic Party Elly Schlein had said shortly before outside the Montecitorio chamber, immediately recalling the few days that had passed since the centennial ceremony. years after Matteotti’s murder.
High temperatures also in the Senate. Palazzo Madama has approved the heart of the premiership, namely the article that introduces the principle of direct election of the prime minister, and has begun examining the other pillar of the reform, the article that regulates government crises. An important step supported by the confirmation that the text will be approved on 18 June, at the same time as the green light in the Chamber for the other reform, differentiated autonomy. A parallel path that strengthens the political pact of the majority, but which also contributes to uniting all the oppositions, who have waged a battle with great harmony on both reforms, even to the sound of blatant protests in the Chamber.
The protests that all the minorities, from Avs to Iv and Action, staged in the Senate took place when the majority approved article 5 of the Casellati bill: the opposition senators displayed signs which led to a suspension of the session. Beyond the hostility to the principle of direct election of the Prime Minister, envisaged by the article, the protests concerned the fact that the text does not say how this election will take place, given that it refers to a subsequent ordinary law. All the minority groups have repeatedly asked Minister Maria Elisabetta Casellati to reassure on one point, that a majority of citizens’ votes will be needed for the prime minister candidate to be elected, in the absence of which a run-off will be used.
In the afternoon, when the next article was being examined, Casellati intervened by attacking the opposition in an animated tone, reiterating that the electoral law for the Prime Minister and for Parliament will be presented after the first reading of the reform. “I would have liked to discuss an alternative proposal that didn’t exist, and I wouldn’t have wanted to discuss the numbers” of the many obstructionist amendments. “I don’t accept lessons on democracy from anyone on a law that doesn’t envisage any authoritarian drift.” Words that rekindled spirits. The path towards approval on 18 June is facilitated by the time constraints, with the exhaustion of those available to the opposition, even if President Ignazio La Russa has granted them two more hours. “If anything, another two weeks would be needed” objected Francesco Boccia, group leader of the Democratic Party, a group that had already run out of time in the afternoon.
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