What is the only way for a centre-left candidate to win a local election? Simple: don’t have the leader of the Democratic Party at its own rally. She understood it perfectly Giacomo Possamai, mayor of Vicenza newly elected in the last few hours. The mayor of the Veneto municipality was the only center-left exponent to have managed to impose (albeit by a margin) in the seven provincial capitals that had gone to the ballot in the regions with ordinary statute. And his recipe for success was almost basic, albeit very effective: begging Elly Schlein not to show up at his speeches in the square.
The winning move of the new mayor of Vicenza
Moreover, already on the occasion of the first round, Possamai had decided not to invite the secretary of the Democratic Party during the electoral campaign. The 33-year-old candidate had relied on the method he had conducted Damiano Tommasi to victory in Verona, a symbol of the center-right that a year ago seemed absolutely impregnable: that is, betting everything on being a “civic” rather than a politician. And so, due to the precise imposition of the new mayor of Vicenza, Schlein never presented herself to support him in the ballot: “We have to build a campaign entirely focused on the city – Possamai had declared – on the topics of Vicenza. This is why the choice not to call the big names in the Democratic Party, as our opponents did with the center-right instead“. Former dem group leader in the Veneto Regional Council, Possamai has always been rather distant from everything that Schlein represents: it is no coincidence that he was one of the supporters of Stefano Bonaccini, then defeated in the primaries by the new secretary of the Democratic Party. Now he has managed to wrest the city from the center-right.
33 years old, Lettiano with a civic mind, to take his city Possamai even refused an armored post in the Chamber of Deputies. He was supported by a long field (three civic plus Pd, Azione-Italia Viva, Verdi-Left alliance and the former deputy mayor of Forza Italia Matteo Tosetto, without the 5 Star Movement) with civic traction, tailor-made for his city, for its peculiarities for his needs. The friend and spin doctor Giovanni Diamanti, son of the political scientist Ilvo, said: “It was a flat-out electoral campaign. Many people in the square haven’t been seen since Grillo’s time“. And it cannot be excluded that one of these reasons was the fact that Schlein kept a safe distance from the municipality of Berico. So, be careful not to be able to shout the fateful phrase: “The left starts again from Vicenza“. Because if that were really the case, there is a serious risk that Elly will be disheartened by Congress Pd.