Autonomous provincial elections: South Tyrol faces difficult government formation
NAfter Sunday's elections, South Tyrol faces the difficult task of forming a government. There are many reasons to believe that the president of the autonomous province, called a governor in the Austrian style, will continue to be Arnaud Compacher of the Christian Democratic People's Party of South Tyrol (SVP). Compacher… After the elections in South Tyrol, Italy's autonomous province, South Trol, saw a difficult task of forming a government following a loss in the vote share of 34.5 percent and a loss of 7.4 percentage points compared to the 2018 election. The Christian Democratic People’s Party of South Tyrorol (SVP) experienced losses, but within limits. The SVP, which has governed the northern Italian province continuously since 1948, fell below the 40 percent threshold for the first time. The number of seats in the Bolzano state parliament also fell to a historical low: 13 (out of 35) seats. The South Tyrot Freedom (STF) party, which aims to return the province to Austria, made significant electoral gains and won two seats in state parliament. However, the government must include a party from an Italian-speaking group under the 1972 Statute of Autonomy, making it difficult for Governor Compacher and SVP to find a partner due to the lack of a partner. The winner of the election among German-speaking groups was the right-wing STF, which gained almost five points and received four mandates instead of the previous two. The Greens, who also retained two seats, were disappointed with their performance, leaving them with three seats.
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NAfter Sunday’s elections, South Tyrol faces the difficult task of forming a government. There are many reasons to believe that the president of the autonomous province, called a governor in the Austrian style, will continue to be Arnaud Compacher of the Christian Democratic People’s Party of South Tyrol (SVP). Compacher has been in power for ten years and his likely third five-year term will also be his last under the provincial constitution.
SVP losses were expected, but they were within limits. A vote share of 34.5 percent and a loss of 7.4 percentage points compared to the 2018 election may be an acceptable result at a time of weakening popular parties in almost all European countries. But for the SVP, which has governed the northern Italian province continuously and operated as a “state party” since 1948, it is painful to fall below the 40 percent threshold for the first time. The number of seats in the Bolzano state parliament also fell to a historical low: 13 (out of 35) seats.
The question of coalition partners arises for Governor Compacher and the particularly hard-hit SVP party leader Philipp Ahammer. According to the 1972 Statute of Autonomy, the government must include a party from an Italian-speaking group. In the last legislative period it was the right-wing national League of Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini. In previous periods of government, South Tyrol governors tended to form coalitions with Italy’s left-wing parties. Return to the South Tyrolean form of grand coalition in the likely cabinet of Compacher III. considered unlikely.
A center-right coalition led by Giorgia Meloni and her right-wing conservative Brothers of Italy party has been in power in Rome for a year. In line with the national trend, Italy’s brothers also made significant electoral gains in South Tyrol, from 1.7 percent in 2018 to six percent now, and won two seats in the state parliament. As a result, Salvini’s League lost a lot of votes, falling by a good eight points to just three percent and losing three of its four previous mandates.
Considering the three mandates of the right-wing parties of the Italian ethnic group forming a coalition in Rome, Compacher and SVP have only 16 mandates. This is two short of the required majority of 18 seats in the state parliament.
And this makes it difficult to find a partner. In South Tyrol there is no percentage threshold for entry into the state parliament, so there are five parties in the state parliament with one seat each and three more with two seats. The left-liberal “Team K” under the leadership of Paul Köllensperger remains the strongest opposition force with 11.1% of the vote (and four instead of the previous six mandates), despite significant losses of a good four percentage points.
The winner of the election among the German-speaking group parties, who make up about two-thirds of South Tyrol’s 530,000 residents, was the South Tyrol Freedom (STF) party, which is fighting to return the province (which was transferred to Italy after World War I) to Austria.
The STF scored almost five points (10.9 percent) and received four mandates instead of the previous two. If everything depended on political views, the right-wing STF would be the “natural” partner of the SVP, the League and the Brothers of Italy (with a total of 20 of the 35 seats in the state parliament), but the separatists would have to jump over their historical shadow.
The Greens must be even more disappointed as they scored nine per cent, but with a 2.2 point rise they remained well below their expectations and were left with three seats. Jürgen Wirth Anderlan, the former head of the South Tyrolean Rifle Association, scored a very respectable 5.9 percent of the votes on his new list and received two seats. The right-wing populist Freedom Party, linked to the APS in Austria, also retained two seats; they lost a good percentage point and gained 4.9 percent.
Besides Wirth Anderlan, another “professional rebel” who will be represented in the state parliament in the future is Bolzano lawyer Renate Holzeisen, whose anti-vaccination list VITA received 2.6 percent of the vote. Former vice-president Thomas Widmann, expelled from the party due to a dispute with Ahammer and especially Kompacher, also wins a seat.
Twelve parties will be represented in the new Bolzano state parliament, three more than before. Overall, a shift in the balance of power to the right can be seen, similar to Sunday’s National Council elections in neighboring Switzerland. Governor Compacher must decide whether to follow this general political trend – in Italy and other EU countries – and seek several coalition partners on the right. Or he will take the SVP even further to the left, for which the party’s historical core voters may resent him.
From a computational point of view, coalitions are also possible between the SVP and various left-leaning parties, from Team K to the Greens, the Italian Social Democrats and the Liberal Left, each with a mandate. In addition to the high cost of housing and living, the election campaign focused on illegal migration and a security situation that many South Tyroleans considered precarious.