Primary Elections For Italian Democratic Party
Last Rush For The Choice Of The PD's Leadership
Oct 18, 2009
On October 25, the primary elections will be held in Italy in order to elect the first leader of the Democratic Party (PD), the largest political centre-left party. The candidates are Pier Luigi Bersani, former minister in Prodi’s government (2006-2008), Dario Franceschini, the the party’s Secretary in office, and Ignazio Marino, well-known surgeon and Senator. The winner of the elections will have the task to lead the party to the next 2013 General Elections against the centre-right coalition, led by Premier in office Silvio Berlusconi.
Rules And First Verdicts
The elections will be conducted as an open primary, with all Italian citizens aged at least 16 and non-Italian legal residents being eligible to vote. A minimum fee of two euro will be requested to voters. The event come after the District Congresses and a National Congress, during which Pier Luigi Bersani was credited by party’s members as the front-runner, with a percentage of 55,13% and more than 250,000 votes: Dario Franceschini follows with 36,95% and Ignazio Marino is third with 7,92% of the votes.
The Political Programs
Even if the political programs are very similar - all of them claiming a better democratic system and a new economic plan, in order to save Italians from the worst economic crisis since the end of the Second Wold War - the internal policy of the candidates is very different: Bersani claims a better definition of the party’s principles without forgetting the individual history of each group - the PD was founded just two years ago as a merger of various left-wing and centrist parties -, Franceschini pushes for involving young generations inside the PD’s structures and Marino supports the idea of a party relieved of the personalities which have led until now and are responsible for the defeat against centre-right coalition during the 2008 General Elections.
The Feeling Of The People
In spite of good intentions, each candidates seems so far from the feeling of Italians: Bersani, considered a man of Massimo D’Alema, former Prime Minister, Foreign Minister during Prodi’s Government and the most powerful figure in the left stream inside the party, is still seen as too much involved inside the catastrophic policy of the last centre-left's government; the campaign of Franceschini, instead, supported by Walter Veltroni, candidate for the party during the last general election against Silvio Berlusconi, appears abstract, raving and without a clear guideline: an example, the posters hanged on the wall of buildings in Rome, claiming for a party only with people born after 1989, that means less than 3% of the Italian population allowed to vote; Marino, at the end, pays the penalty for being new in the Italian politic scenery and not enough known by Italian electors.
Anyhow, no one of the candidates seems yet to own the power and the charisma needed for competing against the centre-right parties’ leaders in the next General Elections, all the more so if they should be brought forward due to a downfall of government in office.
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