Conte wants to link the primaries to the party programme. Within the M5S, some are considering breaking away from the PD

Rome. There is an aggressor and there is a victim. Always. Even in the broader political arena. And then there’s always a pretext, as we know. A technicality around which to construct, if not an attack, then at least a rift. In recent days, with regard to Giuseppe Conte, the pretext – or technicality – is Ukraine. And the rift, should the electoral law ever fall through, would instead be with the PD. No longer just arguing, but breaking the alliance. Indeed.

It is that marvellous thought which, creeping in, rears its head in the most private of meetings. It is that utterly mad idea, made even more mad by the prospect of a majority vote.

And yet, Giuseppe Conte is keeping an eye on the polls. He notes that the primaries, following the summer, have proved him wrong. The latest forecast, broadcast on L’Aria che tira on La7, overturns the spring projections. Perhaps inexorably so. Elly Schlein, backed by Fratoianni and Bonelli, stands at 62 per cent. The former prime minister, who has never resigned himself to his status as a ‘former’, stands at 38 per cent. And so, in September, it is time for him too to move on.

After the summer, the campaign stalls are going up in flames, becoming such a nuisance that they would once again condemn the leader to the status of ‘former’. Those close to him who are reporting on this add a detail. Following the interviews opposing rearmament and the votes on activists’ issues at Nova, Giuseppe Conte now wants to tie the primaries to the party programme. Or rather: he wants specific passages to be explicitly stated on the ballot paper alongside the leader’s name. The infamous ‘red lines’, as they say. The line drawn not only by General Vannacci against Meloni but also by the former prime minister against Schlein. And, among these lines, the ‘reddest’ is precisely the (lack of) support for Kyiv.

Ukraine is the pretext. The loophole. The opportunity to walk away if the bill does not pass or, in the meantime, to gauge the reaction to this highly polarising piece of legislation. “It cannot be that if Schlein or someone else wins the primaries,” Conte has said time and again, “we will then send weapons galore to Ukraine for a conflict that is leading us towards a world war.” This cannot be, according to the lawyer, who is raising the stakes just as Stefano Patuanelli, the party’s leader in the Senate, calls for divine intervention: “We need a new figure from outside the party.”

The point, in short, is that Giuseppe Conte does not want to return to Chigi as a mere lackey. And even if breaking away from the 42 per cent majority bonus would mean pricking the frog carrying him – the PD – and going down with it, the idea has been considered. The thought is there.

The Piepoli polls, which the former prime minister is monitoring, confirm that, for him, the best of all possible worlds – with the ‘Melonellum’ – would be a broad coalition with Conte as prime minister. And that, by contrast, a Democratic Party leader would cause the Movement to lose the most votes overall. The Five Star Movement’s middle ground – leaving the alliance – would indeed trigger a ‘tactical voting’ reaction, but the losses would be less than in scenario number two: the PD with Conte in tow. A horrifying prospect for an electorate which, as Livio Gigliuto explains, “sees in Conte, and only in Conte, a guarantee of a leading role”.

It is important to note that, now the process has begun, it would be difficult to withdraw – and doing so would certainly be considered imprudent. A less complex option, however, would be to attempt one final manoeuvre: shifting, with Ukraine’s support, the focus of the vote towards ‘Prime Minister Conte’. The rest? It is a reckless idea, yes. A marvellous thought that even his most pro-Russian advisers are whispering to him, and which he is listening to, just as Schlein hums other refrains… ‘If I lose you, what will I do…’ She, Elly, no longer knows how to be alone.