European elections: the Right won

In Europe, the right is advancing. In France, Bardella wins with 31.5% and Macron, who took 14.5%, dissolves Parliament and calls new elections for 30 June and 7 July. The People’s Party in Strasbourg are the leading party and Ursula Von der Leyen, the Spitzenkandidat of the EPP, remains the favorite to preside over the European Commission, but she will have to be voted on on 18 July and that is by no means a given. In Italy, the three government parties confirm their strength and together they represent around 48%. M5S under 10%, Elly Schlein’s PD increases and reaches 24%, excellent Alliance, Greens and Left, which goes to 6.6%, with Ilaria Salis MEP with 173 thousand preferences. Low turnout in all 27 EU countries, according to an estimate collected by “Europe Elects” it should have been 1.3% lower than in 2019 (56.09) which was considered the lowest since 1994, but it did not go thus, it was 49.69% and also decreased compared to the elections of 25 September 2022, where it was 63.91%, even if the vote in the general elections is different from that of the European elections.

It is wrong to rely on an overall analysis of the phenomenon of abstention across the entire European Union because each country has its own history and characteristics, which are political and, above all, economic. Abstention from voting, beyond the fact that everyone can read it as they wish, still indicates the presence of widespread discomfort and, overall, a lack of trust in the institutions. In Italy, for example, there is, and is persistent, an economic phenomenon in which the GDP (Gross Domestic Product) is increasing but salaries do not adapt to the increase in prices of consumer products and the cost of living in general . Italy, as certified by the “Istat Annual Report 2024”, manages to recover the pre-Covid level of production and, also, the one before the 2008 crisis, but the purchasing power of wages in ten years has collapsed by 4 ,5%. It is clear that families in general live poorly, at least on a material level, and distance themselves from politics, do not participate and are not involved. At the end of the avenue of family economic sadness they only see the terminal of abstention from voting, which represents, as I think, always and only collective political suicide.

The media and polls had predicted that the Right would win, it is now clear that the EU has little or nothing to offer, also because it is an imperialist pole under construction. An example of objectively dialectical contrast was given by the media and in particular with the “Data Room” by Milena Gabanelli which was broadcast on “La 7” TV, Monday 3 June, entitled “What is the European Union for”. The story was mainly centered on the theme “There is no future for the European peoples except in the Union”. This theme was considered devastating as it probably irritated the listeners, especially due to the series of dialectical questions that were presented. What is Europe for? What does it do for young people? What about pensioners? And what about women, the unemployed, the South? Apparently excellent and balanced, but not for those who, unfortunately, for example due to the privatizations of state-owned companies in Italy, hate the EU and its history because it is the history of European liberalism. Not a word about the fact that the EU wants to increase military spending, be sovereign over all states, especially economically and in foreign policy, and defeat Russia. While for peace nothing was heard. This Data Room was terrible.

All the polls predicted that, of the 76 seats assigned to Italy in the European Parliament, the majority would be right-wing. Now we hope that the problem, which can no longer be postponed, will be posed of how to do politics in a phase like the one we are experiencing, now completely hegemonized by the Right, in Rome as in Brussels. This means that the institutions are no longer democratic, but are right-wing with all the problems on the field, as the reform of the Constitution with the premiership and the law on differentiated autonomy. There is the big problem of healthcarewhich it now was privatised, so much so that the financial resources for treatment are not there. Families, not all of them of course, barely cover the costs of food, house rent and bills. In practice they don’t offer paid tests and private medical treatments, not even to talk about it. The ongoing economic crisis is devastating and there is talk of the European army with that need, entirely liberal but presented with beautiful words, to cover the real objectives of current capitalism of increasing profits, and wars are a way to achieve these objectives.

There were 51.7 million Italians called to vote on Saturday 8 and Sunday 9 June, with 5.1 million residing abroad. In addition to the European elections, voting was also held for the administrative elections in 3,700 municipalities and for the regional elections in Piedmont. The novelties of this consultation were that those outside the office were allowed to vote in the place where they were without returning to the municipality of residence; the application to do so had to be submitted by May 5th. The procedure presented some impediments for those who were resident in an electoral district other than that of the municipality of study, however not such as to justify a very low participation in these methods, i.e. only 19 thousand students compared to the audience of almost 600 thousand, who could take advantage of it. The result of the votes among these voters, with 40% for AVS and 25% for PD, indicates that those who took advantage of this possibility were a minority of students with clear political ideas. Italy elects 76 members of the European Parliament out of a total of 720. The Italian territory is divided into five electoral districts which elect a number of deputies in proportion to the inhabitants. The North-Western constituency includes Valle d’Aosta, Liguria, Piedmont and Lombardy, is the most populous and elects 20 seats. The North-East includes Emilia-Romagna, Friuli-Venezia Giulia, Trentino-Alto Adige and Veneto, 15 deputies are elected. The Central constituency is made up of Lazio, Marche, Tuscany and Umbria and elects 15 seats. The South includes Abruzzo, Basilicata, Calabria, Campania, Molise and Puglia with 18 seats. Finally, the Islands constituency elects eight MEPs. Under European electoral law all countries must use a proportional system. In Italy there is preferential voting, which gives voters the possibility of indicating, within the same list, from one to three preferences, voting, in the case of two or three preferences, for candidates of different genders. The threshold is 4%.

Across the EU, out of a total of 359 million called to the polls, 23 million were young people who voted for the first time in Italy, 10 million were those aged between 18-34, of which almost 2.8 million were the new voters. The outcome of these elections should have oriented the future of Europe, which can never be more “strong and democratic”, as the commercials presented, but half the population did not go to vote. In 2022, abstention from elections was 36.1%. Citizens vote less and less and even less in the European elections: in 2019, 45.5% of the population did not go to the polls, compared to 29% in 2004.

An observation is necessary on point 9 of Fratelli d’Italia program entitled “Strong, Free and Sovereign”, in the last point we read: “Continue the process of European reunification, according to an approach based on merit, both towards the countries of the Western Balkans and towards Ukraine, Moldova and Georgia”. What does “merit-based approach” mean? What are the objectives of Giorgia Meloni, President of the Council of Ministers, on the European Union? This is an important question, I remember in this regard the great audience (over two million viewers) that had his interview with Enrico Mentana on the “TV7” network, on 6 June, in which he said almost nothing about the prospects of the European Union. His interview took place in a manner that was not centered on the EU.

Another observation concerns the Dutch far right, led by the Freedom Party (PVV), anti-Islam leader and Eurosceptic Geert Wilders, who obtained 7 seats. This formation did not win, although it was the surprise winner of last November’s national elections and came first in the polls with a wide margin over the pro-European Labor-Green alliance, led by Frans Timmermans. Allenza, the Green Labor party, which won 8 seats, winning, but with leading candidate Bas Eickhout, Group of the Greens/European Free Alliance. However, one wonders what choice the Green group will make, at EU level, on the ongoing conflict between Ukraine and Russia and the creation of the European army.

Finally, the observation on point 13 of electoral program of the Alliance, the Greens and the Left: “The Italy of peace”. At the end of the chapter we asked for a “Conversion plan for the Italian war industry” and to “Dedicate a national day to the martyrs of the environment” and to “Transform ecocide into the fifth international crime subject to the Hague Tribunal” . These are important issues, but they have been ignored in this election campaign. What will Bonelli and Fratoianni do on these issues in Brussels and Rome also because they had 6.90% of the votes and it wasn’t a given?