Controversy in Italy over the fascist greeting of a strategist and friend of Giorgia Meloni

The latest controversy in Italy, just three days before the general elections, has as its protagonist Romano LaRussaCouncilor for Security in the Lombardy region and former Member of the European Parliament, but also a close strategist and friend of the leader of the Brothers of Italy, Giorgia Meloni, presumed next prime minister. A video shows the leader making the fascist salute at a funeral.

[Giorgia Meloni, la posfascista de padre ‘comunista’ que podría gobernar Italia en otoño]

Romano is the brother of the former Minister of Defense Ignazio LaRussafounder of the party -his middle name is Benito- together with Meloni, who already in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, which hit Italy like few others, published a tweet recommending to stop shaking hands -“contagion is lethal”, said – and instead make “the Roman salute, antiviral and antimicrobial”.

Romano was at the funeral of Alberto Stabilini, a historical of the extreme right in Milan. On several occasions, the attendees, including La Russa himself, raise their right arms to the cry of “present!”. The protagonist denies having done what is seen in the images and assures that he limited himself to performing “a military ritual” for his “old friend” who has been “instrumentalized”, he has declared to the Corriere della Sera.

Stabilini, that “old friend”, was a member of the Youth Front, an organization of the extinct Italian Social Movement, a formation of the last fascists after World War II in which Meloni was also a member. But Meloni wants to distance herself from these facts and the image they project of her, coming in recent weeks to condemn fascism, which she takes advantage of proclamations or symbols such as the tricolor flame in the Brothers of Italy logo itself.

“The only thing in danger is the left”

In recent statements to the Efe agency, Meloni describes his party as follows: “It is the Italian conservatives. We believe in the freedom of the person and in the centrality of the family, in the Italian, European and Western cultural identity, in the initiative private and in social solidarity. We have a competent and prepared ruling class. We feel prepared to govern if the Italians want it.”

Asked by those who see her possible victory as a danger to democracy, Meloni points to her rivals: “It is paradoxical. We have had governments headed by unelected prime ministers. In the pandemic we have seen unprecedented restrictions on freedom. However, only now there is talk of the danger to democracy (…) Nobody believes that (…) The only thing that is in danger is the power system of the left.

[¿Y si la guerra de Ucrania se librase en Roma?, por Bernard-Henri Lévy]

The recording does not seem, however, that it will damage Meloni’s aspirations this Sunday after a campaign that has been played largely in the field of social networks. A few days ago the person named was the former vice president and former Minister of the Interior Matteo Salvini for another video. In this one was seen Alessio Di Giulioa member of the League in Florence, taking advantage of a gypsy woman: “On September 25, the League votes to never see her again.”