By 7 p.m., 51.1 percent of eligible voters cast their ballots, which means that voter turnout is more than seven percentage points lower than the evening of the 2018 parliamentary elections, the Interior Ministry announced on Wednesday. Sunday.
Five years ago, the partial participation rate measured at 7 p.m. was 58.4 percent.
Now, most people – 59.7 percent – voted in Emilia-Romagna, while five years ago their percentage was 62.2. The lowest number of voters went to vote in southern Calabria, 36.9 percent, compared to 49.6 five years ago.
The biggest drop can be seen in Campania, where turnout measured at 7pm was about 14% lower than the 2018 parliamentary elections. The weather was very bad in the southern regions on Sunday. Analysts noted that the low turnout rate may reduce support for the Five Star Movement (M5S), as the party led by Giuseppe Conte was considered the most popular in this part of the country.
It is expected that the polls will close at eleven o’clock in the evening in the parties’ headquarters and in the press centers set up for the elections. About four hundred Italian and foreign journalists adopted themselves at the Italian Brothers Election Center (FdI) led by Giorgia Meloni, which was set up in a hotel in Rome.
In the last polls published two weeks ago, the right-wing coalition led by Meloni showed an advantage of nearly twenty percentage points over the left led by Enrico Letta.
In the last hours before the polls closed, Giorgia Meloni posted a funny video on her social media page, in which she holds a melon in Italian.
(Opening photo: Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi (J) votes at a polling station in Rome on September 25, 2022, the day of the early parliamentary elections, in the photo provided by the press office of the Italian Prime Minister’s Office.)
OPENING PHOTO: MTI / EPA / Italian Prime Minister’s Office Press Office / Filippo Ateli