The 2010 Lombard regional election took place on 28–29 March 2010. The 9th term of the Regional Council was chosen.

Roberto Formigoni Roberto Formigoni (born 30 March 1947) is a former Italian politician born in Lecco, Italy. He was the President of Lombardy from 1995 to 2013. He is the former unofficial political spokesperson of the Communion and Liberation movement. On 21 F ...

, who was the longest-serving President of Region in Italy along with Giancarlo Galan of

Veneto Veneto (, ; vec, Vèneto ) or Venetia is one of the 20 regions of Italy. Its population is about five million, ranking fourth in Italy. The region's capital is Venice while the biggest city is Verona. Veneto was part of the Roman Empire unt ...

, obtained a historic fourth consecutive term. His opponent was

Filippo Penati Filippo Luigi Penati (30 December 1952 – 9 October 2019) was an Italian politician. Born in Monza, He was mayor of Sesto San Giovanni between 1994 and 2001, and president of the Province of Milan The Province of Milan ( it, Provincia di Mila ...

, a Democrat, who was President of the

Province of Milan The Province of Milan ( it, Provincia di Milano) was a province in the Lombardy region, Italy. Its capital was the city of Milan. The area of the former province is highly urbanized, with more than 2,000 inhabitants/km2, the third highest popu ...

from 2004 to 2009. The Lombard League, that is to say the regional section of

Northern League Northern League may refer to: Sport Baseball * Northern League (baseball, 1902–71), a name used by several minor leagues that operated in the upper midwestern U.S. and Manitoba from 1902 to 1971 * Northern League (baseball, 1993–2010), an indep ...

in Lombardy, backed Formigoni in return of the support granted by

The People of Freedom The People of Freedom ( it, Il Popolo della Libertà, PdL) was a centre-right political party in Italy. The PdL, launched by Silvio Berlusconi on 18 November 2007, was initially a federation of political parties, notably including Forza Italia a ...

to Northern League candidates in Veneto (

Luca Zaia Luca Zaia (born 27 March 1968) is a Venetian and Venetist politician, who has been President of Veneto since 2010. Prior to that, Zaia was President of the Province of Treviso from 1998 to 2005, Vice President of Veneto from 2005 to 2008 and ...

) and

Piedmont it, Piemontese , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = , demographics1_footnotes = , demographics1_title1 = , demographics1_info1 = , demographics1_title2 ...

(

Roberto Cota Roberto Cota (born 13 July 1968 in Novara) is an Italian politician, President of Piedmont from 2010 to 2014. After a degree in law, Cota joined the party in 1990. In 2000 he was elected to the Regional Council of Piedmont and was President ...

). Minor candidates who were running were Savino Pezzotta for the Union of the Centre, Vito Crimi for

Beppe Grillo Giuseppe Piero "Beppe" Grillo (; born 21 July 1948) is an Italian comedian, actor, blogger, and politician. He has been involved in politics since 2009 as the co-founder (together with Gianroberto Casaleggio) of the Italian Five Star Movement ...

's movement, Vittorio Agnoletto for the

Communist Refoundation Party The Communist Refoundation Party ( it, Partito della Rifondazione Comunista, PRC) is a communist political party in Italy that emerged from a split of the Italian Communist Party (PCI) in 1991. The party's secretary is Maurizio Acerbo, who repla ...

and Gianmario Invernizzi for New Force.

Marco Cappato Marco Cappato (; born 25 May 1971) is an Italian activist and politician. Cappato was an Italian Member of the European Parliament from 1999 to 2009. He represented the Bonino List within the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe parli ...

for the

Italian Radicals The Italian Radicals ( it, Radicali Italiani, RI) is a liberal and libertarian political party in Italy. Founded on 14 July 2001 with Daniele Capezzone as their first secretary, the party describes itself as "''liberale'', ''liberista'' nd''li ...

did not gain enough signatures to back his candidature.

Electoral system

Regional elections in Lombardy were ruled by the "Tatarella law" (approved in 1995), which provided for a mixed electoral system: four fifths of the regional councilors were elected in provincial constituencies by

proportional representation Proportional representation (PR) refers to a type of electoral system under which subgroups of an electorate are reflected proportionately in the elected body. The concept applies mainly to geographical (e.g. states, regions) and political divis ...

, using the

largest remainder method The largest remainder method (also known as Hare–Niemeyer method, Hamilton method or as Vinton's method) is one way of allocating seats proportionally for representative assemblies with party list voting systems. It contrasts with variou ...

with a

droop quota The Droop quota is the quota most commonly used in elections held under the single transferable vote (STV) system. It is also sometimes used in elections held under the largest remainder method of party-list proportional representation (list PR ...

and

open list Open list describes any variant of party-list proportional representation where voters have at least some influence on the order in which a party's candidates are elected. This is as opposed to closed list, which allows only active members, par ...

s, while the residual votes and the unassigned seats were grouped into a "single regional constituency", where the whole ratios and the highest remainders were divided with the Hare method among the provincial party lists; one fifth of the council seats instead was reserved for regional lists and assigned with a majoritarian system: the leader of the regional list that scored the highest number of votes was elected to the presidency of the Region while the other candidates were elected regional councilors. A threshold of 3% had been established for the provincial lists, which, however, could still have entered the

regional council Regional Council may refer to: * Regional Council (Hong Kong), disbanded in 1999 ** Regional Council (constituency) Regional council may refer to: * Regional council (Cameroon) * Regional council (France), the elected assembly of a region of Fran ...

if the regional list to which they were connected had scored at least 5% of valid votes. The ''

panachage Panachage (, from French meaning "blend, mixture") is the name given to a procedure provided for in several open-list variants of the party-list proportional representation system. It gives voters more than one vote in the same ballot and allows ...

'' was also allowed: the voter can indicate a candidate for the presidency but prefer a provincial list connected to another candidate.

Council apportionment

According to the official 2001 Italian

census A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses inc ...

, the 64 Council seats which must be covered by proportional representation are so distributed between Lombard provinces. The allocation is not fixed. Remaining seats and votes after proportional distribution, are all grouped at regional level and divided by party lists. The consequent division of these seats at provincial level usually change the original apportionment. Only 43 seats were directly assigned at provincial level, and the final distribution between provinces changed in this way. As it can be seen, the

landslide Landslides, also known as landslips, are several forms of mass wasting that may include a wide range of ground movements, such as rockfalls, deep-seated slope failures, mudflows, and debris flows. Landslides occur in a variety of environmen ...

victory of Formigoni's Alliance caused the distribution of seven more seats to the oppositions at provincial level.

Bergamo Bergamo (; lmo, Bèrghem ; from the proto- Germanic elements *''berg +*heim'', the "mountain home") is a city in the alpine Lombardy region of northern Italy, approximately northeast of Milan, and about from Switzerland, the alpine lakes Com ...

and

Brescia Brescia (, locally ; lmo, link=no, label= Lombard, Brèsa ; lat, Brixia; vec, Bressa) is a city and '' comune'' in the region of Lombardy, Northern Italy. It is situated at the foot of the Alps, a few kilometers from the lakes Garda and Iseo ...

received two new seats,

Lecco Lecco (, , ; lmo, label= Lecchese, Lècch ) is a city of 48,131 inhabitants in Lombardy, northern Italy, north of Milan. It lies at the end of the south-eastern branch of Lake Como (the branch is named ''Branch of Lecco'' / ''Ramo di Lecco''). ...

and

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city ...

and

Sondrio Sondrio (; lmo, Sùndri; rm, Sunder; archaic german: Sünders or ; la, Sundrium) is an Italian city and ''comune'' and Provincial Capital located in the heart of the Valtellina. , Sondrio counts approximately 21,876 inhabitants (2015) and it is ...

one each.

Controversies on Formigoni's candidature

Formigoni's candidature, which allowed him a 4th mandate, has been contested by academics and left-wing politicians, as in disregard of Law n. 165/2004, that put a limit of two subsequent mandates to directly-elected Region Presidents. Formigoni was indirectly elected in 1995, but then directly elected in 2000 and 2005. He defends himself stating that the law was not in action when he was first directly elected in 2000, so he should be allowed a 4th mandate. After re-election, his mandate may be overturned by judges later on.Vittorio Angiolini, professore ordinario di Diritto costituzionale dell'Università di Milano; Margherita Raveraira, Università di Perugi
Il limite del doppio mandato alla immediata rielezione del Presidente della giunta regionale: una questione complessa
, Federalismi.itMichele Ainis
La terza via di Errani e Formigoni
, ''La Stampa'', 25 gennaio 2010 Formigoni also sparked controversies when agreeing to put in his majority-premium list, granting her safe election, Nicole Minetti, former showgirl and actual dental hygienist of

Silvio Berlusconi Silvio Berlusconi ( ; ; born 29 September 1936) is an Italian media tycoon and politician who served as Prime Minister of Italy in four governments from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006 and 2008 to 2011. He was a member of the Chamber of Deputies f ...

, who asked for a political seat for her.

Parties and candidates

Results

The election led to the return to the guide of the Region, for its fourth consecutive term, Communion and Liberation's

, supported by the centre-right coalition. If the mechanisms of electoral law generated a

Regional Council Regional Council may refer to: * Regional Council (Hong Kong), disbanded in 1999 ** Regional Council (constituency) Regional council may refer to: * Regional council (Cameroon) * Regional council (France), the elected assembly of a region of Fran ...

very similar to the incumbent one speaking about coalitions, the most relevant change was the five new seats conquered by the League, which obtained its best performance ever. More, the League was strangely penalized by the electoral law, having conquered fewer seats than as it would be with a proportional representation. The People of Freedom was confirmed as the largest party in the region with 32% of the vote, despite a decline of three points, while

Lega Nord Lega Nord (; acronym: LN), whose complete name is (), is a right-wing, federalist, populist and conservative political party in Italy. In the run-up of the 2018 general election, the party was rebranded as (), without changing its offici ...

took the 26% and Democratic Party the 23%.

Results by province

References

{{Elections in Lombardy Regional elections in Lombardy 2010 elections in Italy