Elections in Trieste: the 52,6% refuses Italian politicians

Analysis by Paolo G. Parovel

The elections for the mayor of Trieste ended with the second ballot held on 19 June 2016, which gave victory to two different majorities: an absolute majority, consisting in 52,6% of the electors, who refused all Italian politicians by abstaining from the vote, and a relative majority which, with 26,3% of the votes cast, elected the candidate of a center-right coalition, Roberto Dipiazza.

The candidate of the center-left coalition lead by the PD, Roberto Cosolini, received only 26,7% of the votes, while the Movimento 5 Stelle of Beppe Grillo, which in Italy has won Rome, Turin and other cities, in Trieste received just 10% of the votes during the first round, thus was excluded from the second one.

A success at two levels

The abstention of 52,6% of the voters is a success for independence movement Free Trieste, which decided to encourage it to boycott the Italian elections summoned in the Free Territory of Trieste, currently entrusted to the administration of the Italian Government (not to the State of Italy).

On the other side, archiving the relative majority, 26,3%, is a success for the small and heterogeneous center-right coalition that, no matter what, was able to defeat in Trieste the current Italian ruling party of Matteo Renzi and Debora Serracchiani. All candidates of third parties (including some fake supporters of independence) had already been cleared out on 5 June, during the first round of votes.

The resounding defeat of the PD

In Trieste, the defeat of the hierarchs of the PD is resounding, because they used as heavy weapons both local newspapers (Il Piccolo and Primorski dnevnik), but also promises of public funding, visits of premier Renzi and its ministers (LINK), statements of Serracchiani, defamatory operations, dishonest accusations, and even a fake racist flyer.

The reason for such an unusual effort is that the PD needed to maintain direct control over the Municipality of Trieste to force the international fraud against the Northern Free Port (LINK) with one only chain of power connecting the Renzi Government, the president of Region Friuli Venezia Giulia and national vice-secretary of the party, Serracchiani, and now former mayor Cosolini.

The manifestly excessive pressing of the PD, on the contrary, increased the number of voters who chose to either abstain as suggested by Free Trieste, or to vote the candidate of the center-right coalition. Also, like in many other cities, the PD has lost the support of the middle class and of humble people, because it does no longer represent them since Renzi ultimately transformed it in a radical chic business party, full of arrogance and ineptitude.

False numbers versus reality

Now Italian parties and media attempt to hide the victory of abstentions in Trieste, avoiding to mention Free Trieste and doubling the percentages of the votes received by both the center-right coalition and the PD using the trick to refer those to the number of actual voters, instead of to that of electors. For instance, this is how the 26,3% of the new mayor Dipiazza is represented by the press as 52,6%, while the 26,7% received by Cosolini becomes 47,4%.

But the reality is different, and what matters in the analysis of international observers who monitor the question of the Free Territory of Trieste and of its international Free Port is, 52,6% of electors refused all Italian politicians, and this confirms also the correctness of the political choices of the Free Trieste Movement, as well as its representativeness.

© 20 Giugno 2016