Regional Election Results In Italy Point To Need Of Power Change - Berlusconi

Regional Election Results in Italy Point to Need of Power Change - Berlusconi

ROME (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 27th January, 2020) Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who currently leads the center-right Forza Italia party, says the results of the Sunday regional elections in Italy, which showed weak support for the Five Star Movement, reflect a demand for a change of government.

On Sunday, elections were held in Italy's northern Emilia-Romagna region, which had been reliably left-leaning, as well as in the southwestern region of Calabria.

According to exit-poll data, Forza Italia candidate Jole Santelli secured a strong victory in Calabria. In Emilia-Romagna, the region's incumbent president and member of Italy's centre-left Democratic Party (PD), Stefano Bonaccini was showing a strong lead, according to exit-polls.

"Jole Santelli showed excellent results. Under her leadership, Calabria will become a symbol of the liberation of southern Italy," Berlusconi told his supporters over the phone, adding that the Five Star Movement (M5S) will now have to contend with a rather modest role.

Bonaccini declared his victory shortly after exit poll data was out, saying that his party hoped that Italy as a whole would resemble Emilia-Romagna a little more in the future.

Berlusconi said that "something is about to change in Rome" as the Five Star Movement, which used to get most of its votes in Calabria and Emilia-Romagna, the regions where it originated, is now demonstrating weak results.

On Wednesday, Di Maio stepped down as the head of M5S, the biggest party in the ruling coalition, ahead of the crucial regional elections in Emilia-Romagna and Calabria.

The current Italian government was formed in September 2019 following a collapse of the previous coalition government between the M5S and the right-wing Lega party, which led to an alliance between the Five Star Movement and PD.