A government led by right and center-right parties would not pose a threat to Italy and its allies, Giorgia Meloni, leader of the Brothers of Italy, said in an interview with La Stampa on Saturday.
Meloni, whose right-wing party is leading in opinion polls for Italy’s election on Sept. 25, said comments in the international media about the dangers of the right taking over “don’t make sense.” Warnings about the threat from the right and center-right coalition are a result of scare-mongering by “leftist think tanks” intent on “terrorizing the markets,” she said.
Italy is heading to a new election after the resignation of Prime Minister Mario Draghi last week. The vote will be the first held in the fall in the country’s history, and Draghi will stay on as caretaker premier until a new government takes over.
While the Meloni-led coalition will likely campaign on a mix of fiscal largess and nationalist policies, which might unsettle markets and create tension with European Union partners, the shift into election mode doesn’t jeopardize Italy’s ability to secure much-needed EU recovery funding, Meloni said.
Brothers of Italy’s abstention on a key vote regarding the funding was due to the Draghi government not giving the party — which was the main opposition force — enough time to examine the details, she said. Meloni also said that some of the currently proposed allocation of funding is not being directed at “sectors where we are more competitive than others.”
Meloni said her party’s pro-NATO and pro-Ukraine stance will not change, even as Brothers of Italy prepares to contest the national elections in a coalition with Matteo Salvini’s League and Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, both of which have criticized weapons deliveries to Kyiv and have historically had strong ties with Russia.
As the likely top vote-winner in the coalition, Meloni confirmed that she would serve as prime minister if the grouping won the election with Brothers of Italy finishing first. “Who wins will govern,” she said in the interview.
