“A new era is beginning with us”.
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An antiestablishment female candidate has capitalized on anger over political corruption and deteriorating city services to defeat Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s candidate in Rome’s mayoral runoff.
The Eternal City has its first female mayor in its nearly 2,800-year history after a 37-year-old lawyer from an anti-establishment party won a landslide victory in the Italian capital.
Raggi, a 37-year-old lawyer and local councillor who was a complete unknown only a few months ago, had been widely expected to claim the keys to Rome’s Michelangelo-designed City Hall. “We will work to bring back legality and transparency to the city’s institutions”.
Her centre-left rival Roberto Giachetti, from Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s Democratic Party (PD), won around 32.5 per cent.
The Rome result – although highly significant – was less of a surprise than the one in Turin.
They are being taken increasingly seriously after repeated banking scandals under the Mr Renzi’s tenure, coinciding with economic stagnation. After the massive wins in Rome and Turin, the party is posing a serious threat to the PD.
The previous mayor, PD’s Ignazio Marino, was forced to step down in October over an expenses issue and broader concerns that he failed to handle a criminal network suspected of defrauding the city of millions of euros.
Analysts saw the outcome as worrying for the premier because the landmark victories were achieved by M5S securing the backing or the abstention of anti-Renzi forces encompassing the far-left, the far-right and the centre right.
Also contributing to the shifting political landscape was the election of Five Star candidate Chiara Appendino in Turin, who ousted the incumbent Mayor Piero Fassino. “It will be hard (for the PD) to downplay what happened”, wrote Massimo Franco, leading political commentator for the Corriere della Sera newspaper.
And it was a win based on exactly the kind of pro-change platform and mood that had, until now, underpinned Prime Minister Matteo Renzi’s popularity with an electorate that has grown tired of its political class after a decade and a half of economic stagnation. Five Star’s rise in Rome was fuelled by a big scandal involving alleged Mafia influence at Rome city hall.
Since neither candidate won more than 50 per cent of the vote, yesterday’s runoff between the top two vote-getters was necessary.
Five-Star’s protests against rampant corruption in Italian public life remains its chief asset.
These include universal income support for the poor, tougher penalties on white collar crime and tax evasion, closing down or privatising many publicly owned companies and cutting taxes for small businesses. In the country’s third largest city, Naples, the independent former magistrate Luigi de Magistris was heading to victory over a center-right opponent.
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Five Star Movement was created by controversial comedian Beppe Grillo but gained momentum once he stepped down and younger leaders took charge.
