Referendum, polls show narrowing yes-no advantage. Gratteri: "Defendants and deviant freemasonry will vote yes": controversy

The polls on the referendum on justice to be held on 22-23 March showed only a few weeks agoa ten-point gap between the yes and the no vote, with the former having a clear advantage. A gap that, as the days passed, gradually narrowed, so much so that now, in various surveys, the no vote is just below the yes vote. And there is controversy over a sentence by prosecutor Nicola Gratteri according to which 'the suspects, the accused, the deviated freemasonry and the centres of power that would not have an easy life with an efficient justice system will vote yes'.

The latest poll came out on 12 February and is that of Noto sondaggi. According to this survey, 53% of Italians - 6% less than in the last survey of 28 January - would vote yes to the confirmation of the law on the separation of the careers of magistrates (as it came out of Parliament), while 47% would vote no, i.e. for its repeal.

Two other polls confirm this trend. On 6 February Only Numbers' survey for Porta a Porta was published: the yes vote was at 40.8%, the no vote at 33.4%. On the same day, Eumetra's survey was published; it too gave the yes and no votes as being close. Those in favour of the career separation reform were 52.5 per cent while those against were 47.5 per cent.

The advance of the no vote in the polls seems to have alarmed Palazzo Chigi. So much so that the possibility of the prime minister herself taking the field with ad hoc rallies has not been ruled out. She could hold one in Milan or perhaps in Naples, the city of one of the most fierce spokesmen for the no party, Nicola Gratteri. On the other hand, the PD leader Elly Schlein is also touring Italia for a campaign to listen to the voters that is at the same time an electoral campaign for the no to the referendum.

The leader of the Five Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, will enter the referendum arena with a direct confrontation with Guardasigilli Nordio on 25 February in Palermo. A unicum in the debate between majority and opposition. But the 5-Star campaign also includes the giant digital posters with the words 'Vote no to the save-caste referendum' that have already been camping for days in the subways of Rome, Milan, Turin and Naples and on the canopies and ledwalls of the capital and Milan. Others will arrive close to the key days. For example, in the final weeks before the vote, advertisements will be seen on buses in Rome, Milan, Naples and Bologna; in the final rush, the station ledwalls will also be plastered with the Pentastellati slogans for the no to the Nordio reform.