a challenge to Covid and the risk of abstention

Today and tomorrow, 46 million Italians are called to the polls to constitutional referendum on the reduction of parliamentarians and regional elections of Aosta Valley, Veneto, Liguria, Tuscany, Marche, Campania and Puglia. We also vote for more than a thousand municipalities, including 18 capitals Venice me Mantua. The polling stations will be open today from 7 to 23, and tomorrow from 7 to 15.

Referendum, Covid effect. A boom in resignations in Milan: the City Council seeks “100 presidents of seats”
Regional elections. Pd, the nightmare of 5 to 1: Tuscany in the balance makes the government tremble

They will be very special elections, the first of the Covid era with clear keys: a mask, gloves and disinfectant gel and distance within the polling stations, Civil Protection volunteers outside the offices to avoid gatherings and give priority to weak issues, such as women older and pregnant. Large quantities of masks distributed to protect voting, polling station members and operators involved: 15.1 million surgical masks, 3.4 million gloves and 315,000 liters of disinfectant gel. Fear, especially due to the referendum, is a strong abstention for fear of contagion.

But to characterize yesterday was the flight of the cashiers, scared, despite the assurances of the government itself. “An electoral college, at this time, is one of the safest public places from the point of view of health”, assures the Undersecretary of Health Sileri. “We have followed and made sure that the anti-Covid security regulations can be respected.” Useless. Several municipalities, from Milan to Rome via Genoa, have been forced to make appeals on social networks to cover the gaps registered. In Milan, people only vote for the referendum and there have been around a hundred last-minute resignations by the chairmen of the seats.

Therefore, the City Council has decided to make an appeal to citizens through social networks to ask them to make themselves available. And the response was positive; in fact there was “great civic participation” and all seats were constituted with 178 replacements of presidents and the definitive replacement of 1,620 tellers. In Rome, about a fifth of the chairmen of the seats have been replaced by the City Council due to the resignation of the person already appointed. While only 1,820 people in quarantine have requested to use the vote at home, of the 40 thousand. Among them also Berlusconi, who will vote from his residence in Arcore.

Last update: 01:40


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