Centre-right incumbent Governor Vito
Bardi easily won Sunday and Monday's regional elections in
Basilicata, claiming 56.63% of the vote, according to the final
results that were released overnight.
Centre-left candidate Piero Marrese got 42.16% of the vote,
while a third candidate, Eustachio Follia, got 1.21%.
Bardi was the candidate of Premier Giorgia Meloni's ruling
coalition of her rightwing Brothers of Italy (FdI), the
rightwing League of Deputy Premier and Transport and
Infrastructure Minister Matteo Salvini and the centre-right post
Berlusconi Forza Italia (FI) party of Deputy Premier and Foreign
Minister Antonio Tajani.
In this case he was also backed by the centrist parties of
former premier Matteo Renzi, Italia Viva (IV), and Azione of
former industry minister Carlo Calenda.
In previous regional elections in Abruzzo last month, which the
centre right also won, those two parties had been on the other
side of the political divide, backing the PD of Elly Schlein and
their sometime and reluctant allies in the leftist populist
5-Star Movement (M5S) led by former premier Giuseppe Conte.
The centre left had won previous regional elections in Sardinia.
Piedmont goes to the polls on June 8-9, along with the European
elections, while Umbria will have its own regional poll some
time in the autumn.
The centre right now holds 15 of Italy's 20 regions and the
centre left has five, up from four following the Sardinia win
that had been briefly hailed as heralding a wind of change,
before a crushing defeat in Abruzzo where the incumbent centre
right candidate also won.
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