The Dems ‘archive’ Conte: "Better to think about the Regionals and beating Meloni"

The day after the certification of the end of the wide field by Giuseppe Conte, discontent rises among the dems for what is considered an attack on the Democratic Party and on the secretary Elly Schlein. Sources from the Nazarene reiterate the line already expressed by the dem leader: “Not a minute wasted in controversies within the opposition, the opponent is Meloni”. But they also add that “the objective is to win in the three regions, Liguria, Emilia-Romagna and Umbria. And to beat Giorgia Meloni. We are very determined on this”.

Not that the Conte topic is at the top of the secretary’s thoughts. Today Schlein convened an emergency secretariat to establish the line to be taken on the Middle East: “We must make and ask every effort from the government and the EU to stop this devastating escalation”, explained the dem leader. However, those who are moving on what is happening within the perimeter of the opposition are the front lines of the Pd, starting with the dem president, Stefano Bonaccini. “The vetoes and personal rulings” placed by Conte are unacceptable, explains Bonaccini. Vetoes that the PD MEP, Pina Picierno, has no difficulty in defining as “real blackmail”.

The Dems are especially struck by the fact that Conte has questioned the structures decided starting from the local levels of the parties. This is what makes Debora Serracchiani say that “we should have greater respect for the work of the territories. In Emilia Romagna”, adds the party’s justice manager: “We respect the choices of our territorial federations, who knows whether President Conte doesn’t understand that deciding things from Rome doesn’t always bring good results”, adds Serracchiani. Words that sound like a warning: the Democratic Party will not endorse any ‘veto’ against those who already sit at the coalition table in Emilia-Romagna and Umbria. In Liguria, Conte’s ‘niet’ had the effect of causing Renzian representatives to leave the lists in support of Orlando.

In the region already governed by Giovanni Toti, however, the situation was very different from that of Umbria and Emilia-Romagna, as pointed out yesterday, a few minutes after the ‘de prufundis’ at Conte’s campo largo, even prominent exponents of the Greens and Left Alliance. In the first case, in fact, Italia Viva governed in Genoa with Marco Bucci, today a centre-right candidate in the region. Bringing Renzi into the centre-left, therefore, would have appeared as something very close to transformism.

For this reason, Nicola Fratoianni welcomed Italia Viva’s step back in Liguria as a step that would “strengthen the alliance”. In Emilia-Romagna, on the contrary, the Renzians supported Bonaccini in the past legislature and support Michele De Pascale in the race for the presidency of the Region. “In Emilia Romagna IV has been in government with us for the last five years. Has anyone seen a political problem? No. The Five Star Movement, on the other hand, was in opposition, by choice”, underlines Bonaccini.

And thus Michele De Pascale, candidate of the extended centre-left: “For a broad government coalition, mutual trust and a shared project are needed and it is clear that this unfortunately does not exist today at a national level. In Emilia-Romagna however, not only does it exist, but it has also expanded to over 60 civic lists on the basis of a concrete and ambitious project”. For this reason, in the dem councils in Transatlantic, there are those who turn the issue raised by Conte around: if the leader of the M5s does not want to place the M5s alongside the Renzians, he should raise the question of the regional councils and councils in which his people sit together to representatives of Italia Viva.

Despite the discontent, the PD leaders are determined to do everything possible to win in the three regions, even if a 2 to 1 for the centre-left would already mean having reversed the situation, which sees the centre-right governing in Umbria and Liguria ( before the investigation that led to the arrests and then to the plea agreement of Giovanni Toti). The ‘scheme’ that the Democratic Party could put in place is the one seen recently. The memory of Schlein’s campaign in the last European and local elections which brought the party to 24% is still fresh among the Democrats. A fast-paced campaign, with electoral appointments in the big cities and, above all, in the internal areas, those with the highest percentages of abstentionism.