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Conservative Marco Bucci narrowly won an election for president of Italy’s northwestern Liguria region on Monday, following a corruption scandal that led to the resignation of his right-wing predecessor.
Bucci, mayor of regional capital Genoa, won 48.71 percent of the vote, beating Andrea Orlando, former justice minister and opposition candidate, who won 47.43 percent of the vote, according to results published on the Ministry of the Interior’s website, with around 95 percent of polling stations reporting.
Orlando conceded defeat and wished Bucci luck in a telephone call after the vote, which took place on Sunday and Monday.
The early elections were prompted by the resignation in late July of former Liguria president Giovanni Toti, who was placed under house arrest in May in an anti-corruption probe involving port and beach operations.
The right-wing former member of the European Parliament was elected as Liguria’s president in 2015 and again in 2020 and has said he is innocent of bribe-taking accusations.
Toti, once close to the late prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, was accused of having accepted 74,100 euros ($80,000) in funds for his election campaign between December 2021 and March 2023 from two prominent local businessmen in return for various favours.
Toti had spent most of his political career within right-wing Forza Italia, the party founded by Berlusconi, who appointed him as a party adviser.
Despite his house arrest, Toti tried to remain in office, repeatedly calling for the measure to be lifted, but his allies gradually abandoned him and he eventually resigned.
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