Trentino Tyrolean Autonomist Party

The Trentino Tyrolean Autonomist Party ( it, Partito Autonomista Trentino Tirolese, PATT) is a regionalist, autonomist, Christian-democratic and centrist political party in Trentino, Italy.

The PATT is the unofficial counterpart of the South Tyrolean People's Party (SVP), active in South Tyrol. The two are members of the European People's Party (EPP) and have contested together several general and European Parliament elections.

Simone Marchiori is the party's current secretary, Franco Panizza its president. Ugo Rossi, a former leader, was the President of Trentino in 2013–2018. Marchiori, Panizza and Rossi are centrists and long supported the Centre-left coalition with the Democratic Party and the Union for Trentino (PATT's coalition partners since 2002). Former president Walter Kaswalder, who was evicted from the party in January 2017, held a more conservative (and traditional) position, that resonated well with the party's grassroots. Most Kaswalder's followers, notably including Dario Chilovi and Linda Tamanini (another former president), as well as the group around Mauro Ottobre (the PATT's representative in the Chamber of Deputies in 2013–2018) and the "Tyrolean" nationalists and separatists led by Giuseppe Corona, have left the party too. However, the alliance with the centre-left was broken in the run-up to the 2018 provincial election.

History

Background and foundation

The party was founded on 25 July 1948 as the Trentino Tyrolean People's Party (PPTT).

Between 1972 and 1976, the PPTT was represented in the Italian Senate by Sergio Fontanari.

In 1982 a split between the conservative wing, led by Franco Tretter, and the centrist wing of the party, led by longstanding leader Enrico Pruner, occurred. The first group retained the name of the party, but then changed it to Trentino Tyrolean Autonomist Union (UATT), while the latter took the name of Integral Autonomy (AI).

In 1988 the UATT and AI were merged to form the PATT.

Participation in the provincial government

In the 1988 provincial election the PATT won 9.9% of the vote, losing ground from the combined score of UATT and AI in the 1983 election (14.4%), but joined the provincial government, led by Christian Democracy (DC).

In the 1993 provincial election the party, with 20.2%, secured the best result ever for Trentino autonomists, due to the crisis of the DC. The PATT's leader, Carlo Andreotti, was President of the Province of Trento for the successive five years, at the head of a coalition composed of the PATT and the Italian People's Party, DC's successor, and some minor parties. In 1996 splinters from the PATT, led by Sergio Casagranda and Domenico Fedel (who had been more recently active with Lega Autonomia Trentino), launched a new party named Integral Autonomy (AI), which, as its namesake predecessor, represented the party's left-wing.

In the 1998 provincial election the PATT's share of the vote declined to 12.4%, due to the presence of AI (3.8%) and, especially, the success of the newly formed Daisy Civic List (22.2%). AI entered in coalition with the Daisy, while the PATT formed an alliance with the House of Freedoms and, primarily, Lega Nord Trentino (LNT) for the 2001 general election: under this arrangement, Giacomo Bezzi stood as candidate in the single-seat-constituency of Lavis, but was narrowly defeated.

In 2002 the PATT entered into an alliance with the Daisy-dominated centre-left coalition. Consequently, Andreotti was appointed President of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol at the head of a coalition comprising the SVP, the Daisy, the Democrats of the Left and the Greens.

The splits in the early 2000s

In 2001 the PATT underwent the split of the Trentino Autonomists – Gentians ( it, Autonomisti Trentini – Genziane), that appointed Dario Pallaoro and Renzo Foladori respectively as its president and secretary. The new party was also joined by the provincial councilor Sergio Muraro, from Italian Renewal. However, in the 2003 provincial election, the Trentino Autonomists ran in a joint list with the PATT, in alliance with the centre-left. The PATT-Genziane list won 9.0% of the vote and three provincial deputies, including Pallaoro for the ''Genziane''. However, during the term of the council, also Muraro and Dominici entered the Council in place of Franco Panizza (provincial minister since 2003) and Giacomo Bezzi.

Bezzi's choice to lead the PATT in a stable alliance with the centre-left in the 2003 provincial elections caused a further split with Carlo Andreotti, who founded Autonomist Trentino ( it, Trentino Autonomista). In the provincial election, Andreotti, who ran for president for the centre-right coalition, was soundly defeated (60.8% to 30.7%) by incumbent president Lorenzo Dellai (Daisy), who appointed Franco Panizza of the PATT to his government. Autonomist Trentino, on the other hand, scored a mere 2.2% of the vote and no seats.

Two years later, Bezzi was replaced as secretary of the party by Ugo Rossi.

Alliance with the SVP and the centre-left

After the 2006 general election, thanks to an electoral pact with the South Tyrolean People's Party (SVP) and the electoral victory by the centre-left coalition ( The Union), the PATT was for the first time represented in the Chamber of Deputies by its former secretary Giacomo Bezzi. In 2007 the Trentino Autonomists were formally merged into the PATT.

In the 2008 general election the PATT formed an alliance with the Daisy Civic List and the SVP for the Senate ( Sergio Muraro of the PATT was the candidate in the single-seat constituency of Pergine Valsugana), while for the Chamber of Deputies the PATT supported the SVP. Prior to the electoral campaign, Bezzi, who was not running for re-election, announced that he was going to vote for the centre-right in the election. Also, would-be senator Muraro did not rule out the possibility of an alliance with the centre-right, if Silvio Berlusconi would have become Prime Minister again. In the election, the centre-left was for the first time defeated in Trentino and Muraro was not elected. The loss brought the PATT into a bitter turmoil. Bezzi finally left the party and formed the Popular Autonomists (AP), along with two minor regionalist parties, Autonomist Trentino and the Popular Autonomy Movement. In the 2008 provincial election the AP supported Sergio Divina, senator and leader of Lega Nord Trentino, as candidate for president, while the PATT remained aligned with the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) and Dellai's Union for Trentino (UpT). Dellai was re-elected by a landslide and the PATT gained 8.5% of the vote and three provincial deputies. The PATT took part to the new government of Dellai with two provincial ministers, Panizza and Rossi.

For the 2013 general election, the PATT formed an alliance with the SVP, the UpT and the PD. This led to the best result ever for the party in a general election: Mauro Ottobre was elected deputy in the SVP's list, which gained 4.8% in Trentino, and Panizza was elected senator in the constituency of Trento.

Leadership of centre-left and Trentino

In the run-up of the 2013 provincial election, Rossi of the PATT won the province's centre-left primary election.

In the provincial election, Rossi was elected president with a landslide 58.1% of the vote, while the PATT garnered 17.6% and 7 elects in the Provincial Council (plus Rossi). Bezzi, former PATT leader, stood as candidate for Forza Trentino and gained a mere 4.3% of the vote. Following the election, Rossi formed an eight-member strong government, including three ministers of the PD, two of the UpT, one of the PATT ( Michele Dallapiccola) and one independent ( Carlo Daldoss).

The party contested the 2014 European Parliament election in alliance with the SVP, whose list was supported also by the UpT. The list won 12.2% in Trentino.

In March 2016 the PATT held its congress. Four candidates have filed to become secretary: they include outgoing secretary and senator Panizza (whose supporters notably include Rossi), the party's deputy Ottobre, Dario Chilovi (supported by Kaswalder) and Giuseppe Corona (representing the "Tyrolean" separatist wing). With Panizza as the clear favourite, Kaswalder, who increasingly represented the party's conservative wing and had taken a critical approach on Rossi's presidency. repeatedly tried to forge an agreement between the four candidates in order to have a jointly elected secretary Finally, Panizza and Kaswalder found an agreement under which Chilovi would retire his candidacy for secretary and endorse Panizza, while both camps would support Carlo Pedergnana for president. Consequently, both Chilovi and Ottobre retired from the race, but Ottobre, who was very critical of the pact, chose to run for president instead.

On congress day Panizza was voted secretary by 75% of the delegates, while Corona took 23%. Pedergnana was elected president, by beating his former ally and mentor Ottobre 59–38%. The congress confirmed the strategic alliance with the SVP, while not embracing Ottobre's and especially Corona's Tyrolean nationalism. A few days later, Pedergnana resigned, after some old photos of him doing the Roman salute and kissing pictures of Benito Mussolini were leaked. A new congress was scheduled in June: Ottobre wanted to run again, this time with Pedergnana's and Corona's support, but he finally decided to leave the party altogether. Linda Tamanini, close to Kaswalder, who was trying to keep Ottobre and the "Tyroleans" in, was elected president with 70% of the vote.

Return to the wilderness

In January 2017 Kaswalder was expelled from the party, after months of tensions with the party's leadership and dissent votes in the Provincial Council. Kaswalder launched the Popular Autonomists (AP), while Tamanini resigned from president, being replaced by Federico Masera, and from the party itself.

In the 2018 general election the autonomist centre-left was defeated for the first time since 1996. Under the new electoral system, which re-introduced single-seat constituencies also for the Chamber, the centre-right coalition, dominated by the Lega (LNT) and supported by Kaswalder's AP, won all such constituencies in Trentino. Panizza was defeated in the Senate constituency of Trento, while Emanuela Rossini was elected to the Chamber from the SVP–PATT proportional list.

In the run-up of the 2018 provincial election, the autonomist centre-left broke up, as both the PD and the UpT were no longer willing to support Rossi as candidate for president. The PATT thus ran as a stand-alone list, in support of Rossi. Maurizio Fugatti of the LNT was elected president with 46.7% of the vote and the LNT was the largest party with 26.7%, while the centre-left's candidate and the PD stopped at 25.4% and 13.9%, respectively. For his part, Rossi won 12.4%, while the PATT was reduced to 12.6% and four councillors (including Rossi). Kaswalder's AP and Ottobre's Dynamic Autonomy won 3.0% and 2.0%, respectively.

During the party's congress in March 2019, Simone Marchiori was elected secretary, succeeding to Panizza, who was elected president. Marchiori defeated Pedergnana, who represented what remained of the party's right-wing, and obtained 74% of the vote. The congress also confirmed the political line traced before the 2018 provincial election, the so-called ''Blockfrei'' option, meaning "neither with the centre-left nor the centre-right".

Popular support

The electoral results of the PATT in Trentino since 1992 are shown in the table below.

Leadership

*Secretary: Carlo Andreotti (1988–1994), Piercesare Moreni (1994–1995), Walter Kaswalder (1995–1999), Giacomo Bezzi (1999–2005), Ugo Rossi (2005–2012), Franco Panizza (2012–2019), Simone Marchiori (2019–present)
*President: Enrico Pruner and Franco Tretter (1988–1990), Luigi Panizza (1990–1994), Franco Tretter (1994–1997), Carlo Andreotti (1997–1999), Eugenio Binelli (1999–2002), Rudi Oss (2002–2007), Walter Kaswalder (2007–2016), Carlo Pedergnana (2016), Linda Tamanini (2016–2017), Federico Masera (acting, 2017–2019), Franco Panizza (2019–present)

References

Sources

"Autonomists in Trentino", an essay by Franco PanizzaProvincial Council of Trento – LegislaturesTrentino Alto-Adige Region – ElectionsProvincial Government of Trento – ElectionsCattaneo Institute – Archive of Election DataMinistry of the Interior – Historical Archive of Elections

External links

Official website

{{Authority control

Political parties in Trentino
Political parties established in 1988
1988 establishments in Italy
Christian democratic parties in Italy
Catholic political parties