At the opening of a sports center, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni confronts politician Vincenzo De Luca with his insulting words.
According to reports from “Wanted in Rome”, an unexpected exchange of blows took place between Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and the leader of the centre-left “Partito Democratico” (PD), Vincenzo De Luca, during an event in the southern Italian municipality of Caivano.
The right-wing head of government, who is also the leader of the Fratelli d’Italia party, had self-ironicly taken up the insult with which De Luca had insulted her in February during a meeting with De Luca. According to reports, she greeted the politician with the words: “Presidente De Luca, la stronza della Meloni” (“President De Luca, I am ‘that bitch Meloni'”).
The verbal confrontation between the two politicians began in February, when De Luca mobilized hundreds of southern mayors to Rome to protest against the government’s plans for “differential autonomy.”
Critics like De Luca claim that these plans to decentralize power could widen the divide between North and South and lead to poorer public services in the South, Wanted in Rome reports.
In response to Meloni’s previous claim that De Luca should work instead of demonstrating, the politician told reporters in February: “Is this behavior tolerable? Hundreds of mayors are here because they don’t have money for daily administration, and she tells us ‘work’. You work, bitch!”
The meeting between Meloni and De Luca this week was brief and took place at the inauguration of a sports center in Caivano, near Naples.
In April, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen did not rule out cooperation with the right-wing conservative ECR group, which also includes Italian Prime Minister Meloni’s party, the ultra-right Fratelli d’Italia.
The openness to working with right-wing parties in the EU Parliament after the European elections drew criticism from Chancellor Olaf Scholz, among others. He indirectly warned the Commission President against trying to secure another term in office with the help of right-wing extremists after the European elections on 9 June.
Scholz stressed at a press conference that he was “very upset about the ambiguity of some of the political statements we have recently heard.” His position was clear: “We will only succeed in establishing a Commission presidency that is based on the traditional parties. (…) Anything else would be a mistake for the future of Europe.”
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