Next year’s Regionals, and at this point also the Municipal ones including the first round in Udine and Sacile, could be held on Sunday 2 April with the door open, however, even on voting day on Monday, regardless, in this case, of the date will be chosen by the council.
The result is the result of the combination of the rules currently in force in Friuli Venezia Giulia and the amendments to the Stability law filed yesterday by the councilor for local autonomy Pierpaolo Roberti.
In fact, the Statute of Autonomy requires the Region to go to the polls for the renewal of the Council and the election of the president on a day between the fourth Sunday before and the second following the date of the previous vote.
Therefore, considering that in 2018 the Regionals were held on 29 April, this means that in 2023 it will be mandatory to return to the polls in a period between 2 April and 7 May.
Next year, however, the Administratives will also take place in 19 Municipalities of the Region, two of which – Udine and Sacile – with a population of more than 15,000 inhabitants and therefore subject to a ballot.
However, the current time window for the municipal authorities is fixed in a span between 15 April and 15 June of each year, thus leaving two weeks uncovered in the event that the junta decides – as per the statutory prerogative – to set the date of the Regionals on 2 April.
And it would be absurd, as well as a waste of money, to think of voting for the Region in one day and for the Municipalities in another, perhaps after a few weeks.
For this reason, in summary, Roberti filed an amendment yesterday which explains how, in the year of the Regionals, the Administratives can be convened within the window established by the Statute for the Regionals themselves and by way of derogation from the timing rule set for the Municipalities.
In addition, the junta has also reserved the possibility – again through an amendment to the Stability Law – of voting in two days as established for next year at a national level for the ordinary Regions.
So how do we get to the possibility of voting on April 2? For a variety of reasons.
Within the time window, first of all, Easter and Easter Monday (ie April 9 and 10) must be excluded. At the same time, then, it seems difficult to hypothesize April 23, considering the bridge on the 25th, which would affect an already historically low turnout (around 48% both in 2013 and 2018).
The same speech, then, would be valid for April 30 with May 1 falling on a Monday.
That is, essentially three options including May 7, the last useful date for the Regionals, remain standing. A concrete option, certainly, even if it must be taken into consideration that in Udine the national meeting of the Alpini is scheduled for Sunday 14th and therefore, taking into consideration a first round on 7th May and the ballot on 21st, there would be the risk of keep the city (and schools) in lockdown for three weekends in a row.
Finally, there would also be April 16, without too many contraindications – not even in the case of polls open over two days – and a date within both the time window for the regional and municipal elections.
But then the question is the following: what sense and what purpose would the amendment to unify the elections filed yesterday have?