Jack Smith

Giorgia Meloni has beaten Silvio Berlusconi at his own game

The Brothers of Italy leader is on course to becoming PM

Silvio Berlusconi embraces Giorgia Meloni (Credit: Getty images)

Now it’s official: if the right-wing coalition wins Italy’s election, Giorgia Meloni will almost definitely be prime minister. Earlier this week, the three leaders of the coalition, herself, Matteo Salvini, and Silvio Berlusconi, agreed to formalise the principle that whoever’s party won the most votes would get to choose who ascends to the premiership. Meloni’s Brothers of Italy (Fdl) has a significant lead over any other right-wing party in the polls, and has done so for the entirety of this year.

This kind of commitment will be very difficult for Salvini and Berlusconi to back out of, even if they wanted to. The only alternative they have at their disposal if they did want to stop Meloni from becoming prime minister would be to formally merge their parties.

However, aside from the numerous issues both leaders would face in convincing their parliamentarians and members to go along with it, even this might not work. The latest aggregate figures from Politico’s poll of polls show Lega and Forza Italia with a combined vote share of 21 per cent, behind FdI’s 23 per cent. Lega and Forza Italia are also going backwards in the polls, and have lost vote share since they played a key role in ending Mario Draghi’s government last week. If anything, they are becoming weaker within the coalition, rather than stronger.

Meloni’s political instincts are proving to be sharper than those of her rivals

Lega’s campaign hasn’t gotten off to a great start, after La Stampa published a story alleging that a confidante of Salvini within the party had secretly been in contact with a Russian embassy official in May. The story goes on to claim that this official asked whether Lega would continue to support Draghi’s government. We’re not sure that this will necessarily lead to much electoral blowback for Salvini or Lega.

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