"I hope that my victory marks the path to victory for Vox in Spain." Giorgia Meloni's words a few days ago, interviewed by the Efe agency in the final stretch of the Italian electoral campaign.
These are statements that have drawn attention in Italy, since the campaign of the extreme right seemed aimed at softening the tones, reassuring moderate voters and defusing alarms in Washington and Brussels, especially in Brussels. Meloni seemed determined to archive the famous rally in Marbella, on June 12, when she expressly traveled to Spain to support Vox in the Andalusian regional elections.
"Meloni's speech in Marbella was not liked at all in Italy, especially because of the music, since the Spanish language acquires a very hierarchical and military tone when it hardens and shouts", explains Aldo Cazzullo, the most relevant editorialist of Corriere della Sera . Meloni soon regretted giving that rally. This is what she herself recognized in July in an interview with La Stampa journalist Francesco Olivo: “I saw the video and I didn't like it at all. When I am very tired, I cannot modulate a passionate tone that is not aggressive”.
If the goal was to forget about Marbella, why has the leader of the Brothers of Italy put Vox back on the screen a week before the elections? She has not done it every day, it is true, but she has made some very significant statements. The reason is very simple: Meloni has recovered the hard marks in the final stretch of the electoral campaign, in the face of some (unpublished) polls that indicate a certain stagnation.
One of the mottos of the Brothers of Italy is “not to lower your head”, not to be ashamed of your identity before the left, not to regret what you are. A militant since the age of 16, daughter of the hard Roman right, Meloni can modulate her tone, but she has not come into this world to hide. She has not studied at the Romay Beccaría school, a sinuous Galician academy of which Mariano Rajoy and Alberto Núñez Feijóo were students. She is inspired by Giorgio Almirante, founder of the Italian Social Movement, official of the Republic of Salò, indomitable tribune.
Therefore, a victory for the Brothers of Italy today could be a source of energy for Vox. If the victory is resounding, more vitamins for the party of Santiago Abascal, at a time of decline in the polls and internal tidal wave due to the campaign of destabilization and denunciation launched these days by Macarena Olona, the candidate who crashed in Andalusia. Olona obviously does not work alone. A campaign is underway to resize Vox for the benefit of the Popular Party.
If Meloni manages to form a government and fulfills his program, he will soon come into collision with the European Commission in defense of Italy's “national interests”. The president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has already sent him a warning: "If someone wants to follow the path of Hungary and Poland, we have instruments to act."
If Meloni governs, he will also clash with the President of the French Republic, Emmanuel Macron, since the new diva of the Italian right has a real fixation with the French. In some of her rallies, the leader of the Brothers of Italy has ridiculed the French accent and has accused the leaders of the Democratic Party (centre-left) of being at the service of Paris. "The French defend their national interests very well, we have to learn to do the same," she often repeats at rallies.
The strategic convergence between France and Italy that Macron and Mario Draghi were seeking may be broken and this change in geometry, if it occurs, will have to be studied very carefully by the Government of Spain. New maneuvering spaces could open up for Pedro Sánchez. The Spanish president could appear as the main defender of Europeanism in southern Europe, alongside the Portuguese prime minister, António Costa. The Iberian Peninsula, a reserve of Europeanism, managed by the Social Democrats. More fuel for the good relations between Germany and Spain, as we will be able to see at the bilateral summit on October 5 and 6 in A Coruña.
An injection of vitamins for Vox and more centrality for Sánchez in Europe. Perhaps this is not good news for Núñez Feijóo.
Fights between Spain and Italy on the horizon if the electoral predictions are confirmed? There would be political disagreements between the two governments, obviously, but also possible coincidences. Meloni, for example, defends the construction of an underwater gas pipeline between Barcelona and Livorno, if France maintains its refusal to resume Midcat.
But other dynamics could also be generated: if the government of Italy becomes a serious concern for Germany and the self-styled frugal countries of northern and central Europe, that alert can be transformed into a greater desire to control Spanish and Portuguese finances. . If Italy becomes a "problem" in southern Europe, Spain and Portugal will not be left out.
Let's see the results. Let's see the nuances. Let's see the maneuvers. And let's see if Mario Draghi becomes Giorgia Meloni's Lord Protector.
