2010 Lazio regional election

2010 Lazio regional election
← 2005 28–29 March 2010 2013 →
All 71 seats to the Regional Council of Lazio
  Majority party Minority party
 
Leader Renata Polverini Emma Bonino
Party People of Freedom Radicals
Alliance Centre-right Centre-left
Seats won 45 29
Seat change Increase 17 Decrease 13
Popular vote 1,409,025 1,331,375
Percentage 51.1% 48.3%
Swing Increase3.7% Decrease2.3%
President of Lazio before election

Piero Marrazzo
Democratic Party

President of Lazio

Renata Polverini
People of Freedom

Politics of Lazio

The Lazio regional election of 2010 took place in Lazio, Italy, on 28–29 March 2010.

Piero Marrazzo of the Democratic Party (PD), who was elected President in 2005, seemed a strong candidate for the centre-left in 2010, being the most popular of the possible candidates and the winner in most head-to-head contests with leading centre-right figures.[1] However, an abrupt scandal invested him in October 2009 and finally led to his dramatic resignation.[2]

After that, the candidate of The People of Freedom (PdL) seemed a shoo-in for victory.[3] As Lazio had been a traditional stronghold of Fini's National Alliance party, that merged into the PdL as junior partner of Berlusconi's Forza Italia in 2007, Renata Polverini, supported by Gianfranco Fini, was chosen.[4] Polverini, a woman, was a strange choice for a centre-right party as she was the respected leader of the General Labour Union (UGL), a trade union close to the former National Alliance but independent from it, and a self-proclaimed "socialist",[5] so that she was praised by left-wingers, including the popular newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano,[4] and criticized by a right-wing newspaper, Il Giornale, that refused to endorse her.[6]

After that, the list of the PdL was disqualified from participating in the election in the Province of Rome,[7] that accounted for four-fifths of the total electorate of Lazio, the election was fairly uncertain, with Bonino in the lead according to some opinion polls.

Despite this, on election day, Polverini beat Bonino in hard-fought battle thanks to a 3.7% swing.

  1. ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 2016-03-04. Retrieved 2012-06-20.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  2. ^ "Marrazzo si � dimesso "Soffro troppo per restare" - cronaca - Repubblica.it". www.repubblica.it.
  3. ^ Andrea Cuomo (29 October 2009). "L'effetto-Marrazzo affonda il centrosinistra". il Giornale (in Italian). Archived from the original on 24 February 2012.
  4. ^ a b "Archivio Corriere della Sera". archivio.corriere.it.
  5. ^ "Archived copy" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-06-06. Retrieved 2009-12-21.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link)
  6. ^ "Archivio Corriere della Sera".
  7. ^ "Regionali, Pdl rischia esclusione a Roma - Corriere della Sera". www.corriere.it.