Even if the coalition that will lead the Lombardy Region over the next five years will not change, compared to the outgoing one, after the landslide victory of Attilio Fontana reconfirmed as governor, the balance of power within the centre-right will be subverted. And it is no surprise: already in the September 2022 elections, the Brothers of Italy (also in Lombardy) had become the first center-right party, supplanting the Lega, which instead in 2018 had become, in turn, the first coalition party to the detriment of Forza Italia.
Regional elections, the results
So a large group of members of Giorgia Meloni’s party is preparing to enter the Pirellone, while many Northern League supporters will stay at home. The same will happen to Palazzo Lombardia, seat of the junta, with at least 8 or 9 councilors (out of 15) with the Fdi license plate, as the minister of tourism Daniela Santanché has already made clear. In 2018, here too, the balance of power reversed. So let’s see who will (certainly or probably) enter the Pirellone from the Milanese constituency. At the moment it is still too early for the definitive results, but some candidates can already claim victory.
The editorial: the most boring elections ever
Centre-right
Brothers of Italy is the first party of the coalition also in the constituency of Milan (and of the Milan metropolitan city). According to initial calculations, he gets 22 directors in total and 6 in Milan. With two councilors, you get to the first eight. Christian Garavaglia is full of preferences, with over 10 thousand personal votes, and is a new entry. The first time he was nominated in 2000, but he was very young. In the meantime he was a popular mayor in Turbigo, in the Magentino area, and from there he gathered a great deal of support. Given his administrative experience, he could be appointed assessor in the council of Fontana. Aloof, but still over 7 thousand preferences, another former mayor, this time from Paderno Dugnano: Marco Alparone, already in the regional council in the past. Third in preference, and third former mayor, outgoing regional councilor, is Franco Lucente, also in ‘predicate’ for a department. The fourth is Vittorio Feltri, journalist and leader. Three municipal councilors from Milan follow: Chiara Valcepina, Matteo Forte (former centrist) and Marco Bestetti (former Forza Italia), first on the list in Milan city. Then Maira Cacucci, councilor in Rozzano.
The total councillors
Enrico Marcora, the Milanese city councilor who stays behind (but not too much) and Silvia Maullu, daughter of the deputy Stefano, but after all it was her first electoral experience, disappoint. Very low the conductor Alberto Veronesi, son of the oncologist Umberto, with a past in the Democratic Party, and Laura Molteni, a former deputy of the League who recently moved to Fdi. Below also the philosopher Stefano Zecchi.
The League, in Milan and the metropolitan city, is far from the 6 councilors elected in 2018. Now it will have 2, according to the calculations of the remains updated on Monday evening (and 14 in total). They would be the two outgoing Silvia Scurati and Riccardo Pase. The third position, which however seems irrelevant, is ‘contested’ between the Milanese councilor Pietro Marrapodi and the former deputy Jari Colla. Only fifth is Deborah Giovanati, on whom Salvini’s entourage relied a lot, and only sixth Alan Rizzi, outgoing councilor for the house, a new Northern League acquisition (he was from Forza Italia). The outgoing Simone Giudici and the councilor for culture Stefano Bruno Galli disappoint in mid-table.
And we come to Forza Italia. Berlusconi’s party will have 6 councilors at the Pirellone, one of which from Milan: Gianluca Comazzi would be reconfirmed, therefore nothing to do for the second, Giulio Gallera, who however would return in the event of Comazzi’s appointment as councillor. But in addition, Forza Italia will not have much space, and Simona Tironi from Brescia (with 8,000 personal preferences) is certainly at an advantage. Outside Milan, the result of the surgeon Ruggero Invernizzi, in Pavia, was also good. We will see.
In the Fontana Presidente list (5 total councilors) it is a ‘triumph’ of the president of the bar association, Carmelo Ferraro, who will be the only one elected in Milan. Not brilliant the former mayor of Magenta Chiara Calati, less than 500 preferences, as well as Luca Degani, lawyer and self-suspended president of Uneba, which collects the RSA. A ‘leftist’ Catholic by extraction, his candidacy with Fontana made a lot of noise in the environment, which no one expected given that, moreover, during the covid pandemic he had not been tender with the regional administration.
Finally, for Us Moderates, the elected Milanese (and the only one in Lombardy), with almost 900 preferences, is the undersecretary for culture Vittorio Sgarbi: if he resigns, the general practitioner Nicolas Gallizzi is ready to take over. Nothing to do for the outgoing environmental councilor Raffaele Cattaneo, who was a candidate for Varese: but he will probably be reconfirmed in addition.
Centre-left
Their wounds are being licked by the clear defeat in the centre-left. And the calculations are made to understand how many (few) councilors will be elected. The Democratic Party, which has increased its percentage in Milan and the Metropolitan City from 20 to almost 25% in five years, should elect 6 councilors here out of the 17 total. Paolo Romano, leader of the young people of the Lombard Democratic Party, gets close to 9 thousand preferences and enters the Pirellone together with the outgoing Carlo Borghetti and Pietro Bussolati. Fourth, with an excellent personal result, Simone Negri, mayor of Cesano Boscone. Fifth is Carmela Rozza, another outgoing like Paola Bocci, sixth. The commissioner of Town Hall 1 Lorenzo Pacini and the mayor of Settimo Milanese Sara Santagostino remain out. Not even Diana De Marchi, councilor in Milan, can do it, as well as nothing to do even for the former councilor of Palazzo Marino David Gentili, known for his commitment against the mafias, and Rosa Palone, deputy mayor of Buccinasco.
Majorino’s civic list rewards Michela Palestra, mayor of Arese and metropolitan deputy mayor, who travels on 4 thousand personal preferences. Not far away Luca Paladini, leader of the Sentinelli. The two of them will be the only regional councilors on the list. So Michele Usuelli, outgoing councilor of +Europa/Radicali, re-nominated for the civic post after +Europa decided not to appear, is out. With over 2,500 preferences, he won the photo-finish battle for third place with the Milanese civic councilor Mauro Orso, but it is a bitter victory. Only fifth the director of Galeazzi Fabrizio Pregliasco and only sixth Enrico Fedrighini, historic environmentalist, councilor in Milan. Eighth, but for her it is not a bad result, the national treasurer of the Italian Radicals Giulia Crivellini.
The 5 Star Movement will emerge resized from the electoral round. He had 17% of the votes in 2018, now down to 4%, which means 3 regional councilors, two of which in Milan and the Metropolitan City, where Nicola Di Marco will be re-elected. Second elected journalist and lawyer Paola Pizzighini. The Green-Left Alliance will have only one councilor at the Pirellone and he is elected in Milan: it is Onorio Rosati, who in 2018 was the candidate for president of Liberi e Uguali and did not enter the council. The writer and activist Daniela Padoan was not elected.
Third Pole
A total of four directors for the Moratti Chairman List: one comes from Milan and the metropolitan city, and is the outgoing director Manfredi Palmeri. Therefore, Marco Tizzoni, former director of the Maroni List, cannot do it. Davide Boni ends in the middle, a former Northern League player who has come out of the Carroccio for years in controversy with Salvini’s ‘national’ line. One elected (in Milan and the metropolitan city), out of three in total, for Action-Italia Viva, and it will be Lisa Noja (from Iv), former deputy and now city councilor in Milan. The check on the 29-year-old engineer Filippo Campiotti and on the Milanese councilor of Action Carmine Pacente. Only fourth Elisabetta Strada, outgoing regional civic councilor. And another incumbent is sixth, Gianmarco Senna, from the League and moved to Italia Viva, overtaken by Filippo Ascioti di Azione.
Popular Union
No exponent of the radical left enters the regional council. The percentage obtained by the candidate for president Mara Ghidorzi, an exponent of the Communist Refoundation, was too low, who in any case also obtained over a thousand personal preferences in the Milanese list.