Referendum, Meloni: 'I'm going to vote but I won't withdraw my ballot paper'

'Referendum on 8 and 9 June? I'll go but I won't withdraw my ballot paper'. This is how the Prime Minister, Giorgia Meloni, responded to reporters' questions after the laying of the laurel wreath at the altar of the homeland by the Head of State for the celebration of Republic Day.

Immediate reactions from the opposition. "Indignant but not surprising, Meloni will not withdraw her ballot paper and therefore will not vote in the referendum on 8 and 9 June in which the choice is whether to increase the rights and protections of workers against precariousness, accidents at work, redundancies. After all, in almost 30 years of politics, he has done nothing to protect those who work and break their backs every day, the precarious young people who are not lucky enough to have made a career in politics. It is shameful that this message of abstention with respect to an important choice comes from a Prime Minister on 2 June, the symbolic day of a country choosing the Republic, of the first time for women to be admitted to a national vote". So wrote on social media Giuseppe Conte, president of the 5 Star Movement.

"Meloni," says the Pd Elly Schlein secretary, "is mocking the Italians by saying 'I go to vote but I don't vote'. Instead of saying whether she is for or against the five questions on work and citizenship, she confirms that she wants to scuttle the referendums and that she fears the quorum will be reached because not withdrawing the ballots is equivalent to not voting. Meloni is afraid of participation and of telling the truth that is there for all to see: she is against fighting precarity and improving the citizenship law. Instead of inviting abstention, and doing so on Republic Day, she should at least have the courage to go and vote no. We, on the other hand, will vote 5 yes with conviction, and we will be many!".