Analysis
The Italian right is splitting over policy, Meloni is furious
Forza Italia has made it very clear in every possible way that they consider themselves to be the number two force in the majority. In other words, the balance on which the government was founded has changed.
Italy’s right-wing government alliance turned on each other in the Senate Budget Committee over the tax decree that will go to the floor on Thursday for a vote of confidence. The conflict is only the tip of the iceberg, signaling deeper tensions that are likely to escalate.
According to Lega Senator Claudio Borghi, the government had given the okay for a cut in the public TV tax “of €20 for 20 million subscribers, including millions of poor families.” But at the time of the vote, Forza Italia voted with the opposition and the amendment to cut the tax was defeated by two votes.
Forza Italia have long opposed Salvini’s push, who wrote in his election manifesto that he wanted to cut the TV tax, and proposed compensating for the shortfall with general taxation or by raising the ceiling on advertising sales. This is something the Berlusconi family is adamantly opposed to, although on Wednesday Forza Italia leader Antonio Tajani, while saying he was opposed to the Lega proposal, ruefully dismissed any notion that the family of the party founder had influence on the party's programmatic lines.
From the Prime Minister’s office came a statement that “the stumble of the majority on the issue of cutting the public TV tax benefits no one,” while repeating the usual refrain: “The government is strongly committed to supporting families and businesses, always working within a framework of credibility and seriousness.”
The truth is that Giorgia Meloni is said to be furious: she is accusing Tajani of not respecting the “kitchen table agreement” they made the day before, according to which his party should have abstained on the TV tax amendment. The plan was that the vote on the amendment would end up 10 against 10, but the right would prevail anyway thanks to the tie-breaking vote of the committee chairman, Nicola Calandrini (FdI).
Right after the vote, Dario Damiani, a Forza Italia senator, had this to say: “It wasn’t a show of force,” he insisted. “We had said that the amendment was divisive, and we voted accordingly. After that, we voted for all the amendments.”
And there is another element that is likewise fueling the Prime Minister’s rage: Italy made no contribution at all to the ceasefire in Lebanon, even though the Italian contingent plays such a major role in the UNIFIL peacekeeping mission. This has soured Meloni’s relationship with Tajani, the Foreign Minister.
In any case, Forza Italia has made it very clear in every possible way that they consider themselves to be the number two force in the majority. In other words, the balance on which the government was founded has changed. The Lega disagrees, invoking the fact that they still have more parliamentarians: the September 2022 vote gave Salvini about 20 more. Meanwhile, Meloni insists that, as leader of the FdI, she holds the “golden share.” Which means that she can play the early election card whenever she chooses. She would, however, have to justify such a use of the last resort option to President Mattarella.
Finally, there is the matter of replacing European Affairs Minister Raffaele Fitto (FdI), who was just appointed Vice-President of the European Commission. Meloni doesn’t want any talk about changes in the allocation of seats among the coalition parties, but Forza Italia are hungrily eyeing Fitto’s seat (which is said to have been promised to Elisabetta Belloni), where they’d like to install former group leader Alessandro Cattaneo.
To sum up, grudges remain and vendettas are being played out. This was clear when, in the same Senate Committee, an amendment on Calabrian healthcare budgets submitted by Claudio Lotito (Forza Italia) was rejected. And the RAI public television remains a topic rife with clashes and division. On Wednesday, another meeting of the RAI Supervisory Committee could not take place after being boycotted by the members from the government alliance. On the agenda was voting on Simona Agnes’s nomination as President of the RAI Board of Directors, a figure strongly supported by Forza Italia, but who would be rejected in an open vote because the Supervisory Committee requires a 2/3 majority, which has led to a weeks-long standoff with the members from the majority boycotting the vote for their own nominee.
At this point, the tensions that are brewing on the right are also creeping into this clash: the Lega, in particular, has no incentive to resolve the standoff, because the current acting president of the Board of Directors is the most senior board member, Antonio Marano, from the Lega.
The opposition forces seized the opportunity to go on the attack: “On the matter of this decree, the majority is showing that it is very frail,” Five Star group leader Stefano Patuanelli pointed out. “And it’s not over, because the issue of payback will remain.” His PD counterpart, Francesco Boccia, said that “it’s clear that the tax decree, which we asked to be withdrawn, is emblematic for their government pact: they are together only and exclusively in order to hold power, as we denounced from day one of this legislature.”
Originally published at https://ilmanifesto.it/destra-divisa-meloni-furiosa on 2024-11-28