Pleasure, Marco Bucci«Mayor of Liguria». Half past eight hasn’t even arrived, on the evening of the endless counting of the Ligurian vote, and the new president of the Region already appears like this to his people. Autoronic up to a certain point, politically ungrammatical, above all (at this time by a handful of votes and little more) “winning”. Practically a manifesto of his political career, which began almost by chance with his candidacy for mayor of Genoa in 2017 and culminated last night by winning a challenge that seemed impossible, conquering a Region against almost everything and almost everyone.
Furthermore, Bucci arrived at the most unexpected exploit while he was still being treated for the melanoma that had led him to reject his first candidacy proposal, in August, when before the decisive phone call from Giorgia Meloni in mid-September he had said “no” to the requests of the local centre-right. The weight of the corruption investigation that overwhelmed the former governor and lifelong friend in May, Giovanni Totiand the center-right itself, is a “distant memory”.
And so a game that seemed lost from the start, supported at a safe, prudent distance even by the national leaders of the front, was instead won in a sprint «because I put my face to it – they will be the first words as president, in the Genoese party as mayor and governor together – and luckily people remember the good things and not the bad ones, and the Ligurians remembered the bridge I rebuilt and not the investigation.”
The rest of the character is this one, a mixture of stubbornness and self-satisfaction for the successes achieved. «The mayor who screams», he is nicknamed in the Municipality. “Few words, many facts” has been one of his mantras for years. Little, very little political culture, demonstrated yesterday too between invasions of the pitch («If I were Orlando I would hit Conte and Grillo like that») and more or less sincere admissions on the functioning of the world in which he ended up («I learned many new things, among exit polls and projections, or whatever they’re called”), but a certain self-satisfied work culture.
Thus, Bucci won his third campaign in seven years. This time at the end of a lightning campaign: “forty-five heart-pounding days”, as he defined them, from 12 September (the day of the yes to the proposal) to the first event experienced alongside the leader who chose him, three days ago. And in the name of a fame that faltered in Genoa, where Andrea Orlando won, but held up in the rest of Liguria.
“The man of reconstruction”, Matteo Salvini chanted from the stage at the campaign closing last Friday. “The right man”, Meloni blessed him again yesterday after his victory, calling him a “tireless administrator”. «The man of challenges, always and in any case», says his wife, Laura Sansebastiano, pastry chef by profession. She became a spin doctor without his knowledge even in this election campaign.
“Challenges” also won by outsiders, as in 2017, when Bucci was the centre-right mayoral candidate who snatched red Genoa from the left for the first time. Or on the wave of popular participation: it happened when, between 2018 and 2019, he was the mayor-commissioner of the reconstruction after the collapse of the Morandi bridge, the undertaking which in recent years on the right has become the electoral postcard good for all political seasons: the launch for the reconfirmation of Toti in the Region in 2020, the reconfirmation of Bucci in the Municipality in 2022, and now the successful bet of Giorgia Meloni, who a month ago convinced him with a phone call to retrace his steps and accept the race for the center-right.
“An episode of desperation”, some on the right also defined it, in the midst of the stalemate over the choice of candidate. “What message are we sending if the only one we find is in these health conditions.” Nevertheless. Yet he prevailed, even in spite of the lapses in style of some opponents, precisely on the topic of the disease fought day by day. «The more I campaign, the better I feel: working hard in the area strengthens my immune defenses», he replied.
An epic, that of the narrative pumped from the right of the “mayor of action”, “the mayor stronger even than the disease”, the mayor against “The lords of the no to the infrastructures of the left” which weighed more than everything else, of course more than the judicial earthquake. «I don’t talk about judicial matters, nor will I ever talk about them: I am of the American school», he repeated for six months like a Ligurian Fonzie, almost incapable of pronouncing the word “investigation”. “I have 300 percent confidence in the magistrates but I think about the future, and not the past”, he confirmed yesterday as soon as he was elected, to those who pointed out to him the presence of very few Totians in the party of his electoral point.
A stone over the key theme of the Ligurian electoral campaign, that tangentopoli which led to the arrests, resignation and plea bargaining of Toti, who was the inseparable half of the new governor for seven years. A stone above, in some way, confirmed by the vote of the Ligurians. «We won by a narrow margin, a few thousand votes – was the first message sent to sailors last night – now it’s up to us and the parties to discuss how to move forward: there will be discussion, but they know that I’m in charge here».
Always allergic to party dynamics, Bucci’s victory at this point ultimately opens up new games. In the local context, because his rise in the Region will lead to new elections in the Municipality of Genoa next spring, but in a city where the vote has clearly said the majority prefers the mayor’s opponents to the mayor himself. And in the national context, where the first set of the autumn match, the round of regional elections seemed to have been a conquering ground for the centre-left, but instead it went to the right. Once again. Despite it all.
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