Vito Leccese, Decaro's successor in Bari: from quarrel to M5s support

In Bari, the wide field won, with the centre-left once again united (PD, Greens, M5s and Italian Left). The Pd candidate Vito Leccese, 61, former chief of staff of the outgoing first citizen Antonio Decaro, is the new mayor. He beat in the ballot the centre-right candidate Fabio Romito, After having obtained 48% of the vote in the first round, coming close to victory, the agreement with the Five Star Movement that had previously been lacking was finally reached. The new mayor of Bari struck a deal with Michele Laforgia, who was the candidate of the Pentastellati and Avs in the first round. And this was the winning move. Pd, M5s and SI decided to present themselves united at the ballot on 23 and 24 June, without an affiliation, after having signed a protocol on legality. Now that Leccese is mayor, the commitment is to give representation in the council to the coalition led by Laforgia as well.

Bari is a nationwide game, also crucial in view of the 2025 regional elections. After 20 years, the centre-left government of the city continues. In the final days of the election campaign, Pd secretary Elly Schlein, Puglia governor Michele Emiliano and outgoing mayor of Bari Antonio Decaro, pulled the wool over Leccese's eyes from the stage set up in the heart of Bari Vecchia.

The electoral campaign in Puglia's capital has been characterised by the repercussions of the judicial enquiries that have swept the centre-left in recent months, including the arrests for political-mafia vote-swapping in the 2019 municipal elections, which led to the dispatch to Bari of a ministerial commission that could dissolve the city council even after the renewal of the administration. It was precisely the investigations that pushed the leader of the Cinquestelle, Giuseppe Conte, not to hold the primaries to choose the centre-left's united candidate and to support Laforgia in the first round. In extra time an agreement was reached, and the broad field compacted.

Leccese has a long political career behind him. At the age of 23, he was elected municipal councillor in Bari at the local elections of 1985 with a list that was an alternative to the party system, acting as spokesman for the demands of environmentalists and pacifists. He was president of the Bari section of Legambiente. In 1992, at the age of 29, he was elected deputy on the Greens' list in the Bari-Foggia constituency. On that occasion he obtained over 5,000 preferences. In the 1996 general election he won the Gioia-Putignano Chamber of Deputies constituency for the Ulivo party. From 1999 to 2000 he was councillor of the Province of Bari. In 2001, disappointed with his electoral defeat in the Chamber's constituency 21 (Bari - Mola di Bari) and in contrast with the new leadership of Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio's Greens, he left direct politics. But he has held various managerial positions in institutions. Now the return.