Melonesky’s ‘walls’. Against Putin’s half-brothers: Vannacci, Conte, Salvini. Signs of a hyper-party

It stretches out like her fingernails, and even her surname now extends to Melonesky, taking on an indelible Ukrainian yellow hue, because, as Meloni says in the Senate whilst defending Zelensky, “no one will convince me that the surrender of those defending their freedom can be called peace” and “personally, I do not regret the Russian tanks that crushed the uprisings in Prague and Budapest; I do not regret the Berlin Wall”. There is no room for Vannacci, never again, and her rival, in the daytime, is Giuseppe Conte, who, under the new electoral law, would not have “become Prime Minister”, whilst Trump’s decision on Russian diesel “is a decision I consider risky”. No sooner had she finished speaking than she was applauded by the PD senators – Casini, Sensi, Zampa, Verini, the Renzi-aligned Lella Paita – and the pro-Draghi European League member, Massimo Garavaglia, who announced to Il Foglio, in a light-hearted tone: “I’m standing as secretary of the League”. This is a Meloni who plays the right wing of the left and the left wing of the right, so much so that Fabio Rampelli, the FdI ‘seagull’ who has watched her rise, muses: “Giorgia is trying to pick up what Forza Italia and the League are losing.” The Lega benches are empty, but these statements are a boost, and Meloni is at her best when she responds to Zacharova’s “Brothers” – those hooligans of conscience. 

She responds to the scum generals, the Vannaccis, and the traitors of Futuro Nazionale. Meloni responds on the subject of Russian gas, stating that ‘it doesn’t cost Italians any less, only the Russians’, to the point of earning an attack from the Kremlin – the finest accolade she could receive – that mafia-style warning from the Russians: ‘It’s none of your business’. This time, her words carry the weight of a party aiming to exceed thirty per cent; there is a manifesto that the left is still struggling to draft; and there is Meloni’s strategy – which some call the ‘cannibalisation’ of her allies – but which is in fact yet another calculated risk: the need to cover the centre, the right, and the centre-right. Even in the Chamber of Deputies, League members are absent, and in FdI lawmakers are snapping photos and passing them around: “Look…”. Salvini has fled to Brussels, Tajani is absent with leave, and Giorgetti has departed for Bangkok with the budget, the accounts, and the funding to be secured. It is as if the entire “West” were resting on Meloni’s shoulders, along with the coalition, which she always defends tooth and nail.

Her “don’t lecture me” is particularly strident when she speaks of the national interest and Ukraine. What is happening? She wants to go where Tajani and Salvini cannot, and this is the first time Meloni has called for the resignation of the Vannacci supporters – MPs who, she points out, “were elected on our manifesto”. She lashes out at Peppe Provenzano – and this, too, is a badge of honour (though for Provenzano, who is being elevated to the status of a rival) – “because there is a certain misogyny here, and it is only right that our colleague Boldrini should intervene”. In the Senate, Meloni speaks for almost an hour, whilst in the Chamber of Deputies she responds with her usual biting remarks. She is annoyed by what she calls the ‘rhetoric of Russian gas’, a phrase that features in Francesco Filini’s ‘Bussola’ newsletter, where we read: ‘Anyone calling today for a return to Russian gas is either acting in bad faith and has different objectives (national or international) or does not know how it works’.

The left has three resolutions, but the right has also tabled an additional one, drafted by Gasparri. It’s a bit of a mystery. Lucio Malan, the FdI group leader in the Senate, when asked why an additional resolution had been drafted – and whether this might be a way of cornering the Lega, again on the subject of Kyiv – replies that “more than anything, it’s a way of finding out whether the left, or at least part of it, will vote for it too”. All eyes are on Carlo Calenda, the only one – alongside Graziano Delrio – who is concerned about the ills of this troubled world, the only one to suggest to Meloni that she should follow Macron’s example (summoning all opposition parties, considering the risk of Russian interference); yet even Calenda, in the end, does not vote in favour. Meloni’s proposal to appoint a diplomatic figure to negotiate with Putin – which was Fazzolari’s old idea – crumbles like a grand illusion, and it is perhaps to compensate for this lofty rhetoric that the discussion descends into the past, into personal attacks.

Meloni, who criticises the left for failing to resolve the Ilva crisis, is mocked by Renzi, who compares her to the Blues Brothers, though even Renzi acknowledges that “she’s doing well on Kyiv”. Only Filippo Sensi and Enzo Amendola manage to outdo Meloni on the merits of the issue. Sensi when he says: “She talks about Ukraine, but we’re only providing generators, not weapons, and the decree is stalled”. Amendola, who knows how to undermine her on the subject of the European Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) and the restrictions imposed by the EU, says: “It’s a shame that Minister Pichetto, a minister in Meloni’s government, signed the agreements on the ETS.”

Parliament is being stripped bare, and so are the words. Edoardo Ziello, the deputy editor-in-chief, introduces the term ‘Napoleonite’ and speculates about unspecified friends, ministers and undersecretaries close to Zelensky who are allegedly up to all sorts of shenanigans. The spread is rising, as are the opposition’s motions, which have shot up to seven in the Chamber of Deputies. They are a bit like the tax rates that Meloni would like to extend to incomes of up to 50,000 euros. We have now reached the point of crunching the numbers. Stefano Putuanelli, Conte’s deputy – who deserves credit for his originality and long-term thinking – admits that “you can’t win just with algebra, by adding up all the centre-left parties”, going so far as to suggest that perhaps, just perhaps, the left needs to start thinking about running separately to “prevent Meloni from securing the majority bonus”. Not far away, Renzi – who compares Meloni to Gigi Proietti when she talks about Europe – asks journalists: “Are you sure the primaries will go ahead?”

Conte, too, responding to Meloni, says, “You are deserters.” “He’s written his usual little letter to the EU,” “We’re risking a world war on our doorstep,” he says – though he is actually addressing Schlein, who is attempting to overtake at the Palazzo Chigi junction. Things are becoming clearer. Divided by the wall, on one side stand the Red Army of the broad coalition and the Russian one. The rift is widening: the Russian side is home to Vannacci, but also to the League, which is beginning to desert the proceedings – a League that would very much like to embrace the traitorous general and buy Putin’s gas. On the other side of the wall are Meloni, a satellite version of Forza Italia, and Giorgetti, who must now find three billion to cut income tax. A draw is perhaps the best a moderate and a European could hope for.