“Centrini” on a journey with an unknown outcome: will they all side with Renzi or not?

Rome. What role do the centres (and mini-centres) play at the heart of the centre-left? The tongue-twister is not out of place, given that yesterday Riccardo Magi, secretary of Più Europa, suggested in La Repubblica a possible (and increasingly necessary, given the new electoral law) ‘unified list’ that could even include Matteo Renzi, ‘provided Renzi remains loyal’. At present, Magi is not among those invited to the Leopolda, Renzi’s gathering due to open in Florence on 2 October, but the issue is not this so much as the stance (expansionist or otherwise) that the former prime minister might adopt; his party, Italia Viva (with its ‘Casa riformista’ project), would not be penalised by any new electoral law, unlike other political forces. Viewed from the outside, in fact, Renzi never stands still (and not everyone in the centre of the centre-left sees this as a plus): less than a day after his latest book, "Qvando c’era lei – l’Italia dopo Giorgia Meloni" (published by Solferino), the former prime minister is spearheading the creation of a ‘mayors’ network’ through a series of presentations: last Monday in Rome, at the Auditorium, with the Democratic Party mayor Roberto Gualtieri, in the name of a long-standing relationship of mutual respect, the entry of IV into the Roman city council majority, and the mad idea of that ‘duet’ launched by Luciano Nobili, a Renzi-aligned councillor for the Lazio region, under the direction of the Democratic Party MP and pillar of the Roman Democratic Party, Claudio Mancini. On Tuesday in Milan, amid a crowd of supporters and in conversation with the outgoing centre-left mayor Beppe Sala, the same logic of long-standing mutual respect applied. In short, wherever you go, you find Renzi: from Genoa, with a remote endorsement for Silvia Salis as a figure who could lead the broad coalition, to Salerno, with an invitation to the Leopolda for the mayor and former governor of Campania, Vincenzo De Luca. A unified list? Who knows. In the meantime, however, behind the scenes in Renzi’s camp, the emphasis is on “the willingness, right from the start, to work together and to make available the infrastructure of an already established party”, but also on the unwillingness “to be vetoed”, having received, over the months, “responses that were not exactly welcoming”. The Leopolda, therefore, will not mark the start of a sort of ‘centrist confederation’, as some of the future participants joke, pointing out that nothing is ruled out and that, with Magi, there was, back in 2024, the precedent of the ‘United States of Europe’ list. But what do the others, at the heart of the centre-left, say about a possible united list with Renzi? The former director of the Revenue Agency, Ernesto Maria Ruffini, founder of the Più Uno movement (set to become a party on 10 October), believes that “the union of centrist forces is not a ‘necessary choice’, as he reiterated to this newspaper a few days ago, and that ‘an effective political alliance’ should not arise from a mere ‘algebraic sum’ of parties, but rather from the construction of ‘a shared, citizen-oriented programme’.” Alessandro Onorato, leader of Progetto Civico Italia and councillor in the Gualtieri administration, buoyed by the many endorsements from local councillors across Italy and despite the looming obligation of the (excessive) signature collection, would like to prevent the debate on the reformist camp’s path from fuelling “a ‘Casa Vianello’ effect; politics is a serious matter”, he says. Former minister Vincenzo Spadafora, on the other hand, points out that his association, Primavera, “has long been proposing a Constituent Assembly that is not merely a collection of small parties, but a genuine project involving all those centre-left voters who do not identify with the PD or the M5S.” Magi must first and foremost clarify whether his position is an isolated one or whether it is shared by Onorato – who has repeatedly pointed out that he already has an agreement with Più Europa and the PSI, to the extent that they are ready to stand alone in the next elections”. Would this rule out a future alliance with Renzi? “If they have now changed their minds because they’ve had a reality check”, says Spadafora, “that’s excellent news”. Enzo Maraio’s Socialists say that the issue “is not one of loyalty”, but “the project”. “The broad coalition should be pluralistic,” says Maraio, convinced that “the allocation of leadership should not be conditional on exemption from the signature collection process”. No to annexation, then, and, it seems, no to co-optation either.