“You don’t change a team that wins”: it is from this assumption that the reasoning of the secretary of the League in Romagna, the deputy and former undersecretary Jacopo Morrone, starts to explain his thoughts regarding the formation of the next municipal council in Forlì after the re-election of the mayor Gian Luca Zattini. Morrone is also keen to point out that it is his opinion.
“We won thanks to our magnificent mayor – he specifies -, but also to the team that has supported him in these five years. I therefore believe that the backbone of the council that led to this extraordinary result, but which also did so well in city government”.
A scheme that saw two councilors for the League, one of which, Daniele Mezzacapo, in the role of deputy mayor; the other, Andrea Cintorino; then another councilor indicated, even if without the party card, namely Valerio Melandri; the president of the city council in the person of Alessandra Ascari Raccagni, of the Republican Party, but elected on the League list in 2019.
However, the numbers at the time for the League were different: in fact, it had won over 24% of the preferences and in various situations the mayor recalled how Morrone himself could ask for much more at the level of councillors, as confirmed by the MP himself . “With the numbers we had we could have asked for four or five councillors, but we worked as a team, because our intention is to govern for a long time. I ask that we can have the same attitude in the formation of the next council, valorising the figures who have done well done in these five years. I wouldn’t fail any of the outgoing councillors.”
Now the numbers are different: Fratelli d’Italia is the first party in the coalition with 19.2% of the votes, followed by the civic Forlì Cambia with 14.5%. Both formations in the past council indicated ‘only’ one councilor: Marco Catalano for FdI and Paola Casara for civic. “I don’t make it a question of numbers – continues Morrone –, for me a councilor like Vittorio Cicognani is indispensable”.
In 2019, the director of the Zattini operation was Morrone himself: “I personally called people like Rosaria Tassinari, who had done so much good in Rocca San Casciano remember – and Paola Casara who no longer wanted to get involved in politics, to get us all around the idea of to be able to govern the city of Forlì. Now it’s not up to me to direct the formation of the next council, I don’t have to make the calls. It’s not just a question of numbers and preferences taken, we need to continue with a proven team.”
Preferences that the League, however, was able to take home, the only centre-right party with its 8.7% which has increased in consensus compared to the numbers recorded in the European elections which were held at the same time. A percentage of votes that allows her to bring three councilors into the council. “It would have been four – comments the secretary of the League –, but fourth place was assigned to the mayor. Usually it is headed by the party that gets the most votes, but Sometimes, due to mathematical alchemy, it doesn’t happen and this time it happened to us.” Another ‘credit’ to be collected in the formation of the next council.
