Italy's Meloni closes campaign ahead of weekend vote

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Giorgia Meloni, the Italian far-right leader, closed her campaign for the elections which will take place on the weekend. Speculations arise that potential victory, which many have predicted, will be ruined by a shift in southern popularity. 

The 45-year-old leader of the Brothers of Italy, which is a far right-wing party, has recently taken questions from a vastly youthful audience on the beachfront before a campaign blackout pre-vote.

Meloni, in her event, vowed to work to help a region suffering from high unemployment and poverty. 

Italy's far right has been on a rise. In the last official polls, Meloni and her right-wing alliance which includes Matteo Salvini's League and Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia, have been winning the polls. 

Italy's former premier, Silvio Berlusconi, said in early August that he hoped to return to Italy's parliament in September's elections, almost 10 years after his expulsion from political life for a tax fraud conviction.

In July, Berlusconi had a role in bringing down Prime Minister Mario Draghi by withdrawing his support, thus paving the way for his center-right Forza Italia party to return to power in September 25 elections.

Analysts predict that the far-right will be winning Sunday, which would mark the first time the far-right won in Italy since the fall of dictator Benito Mussolini post-WW II. 

Italy's new far-right thrives on anti-immigrant discourse

As part of Italy's new far-right direction in its campaign for the September 25 election, Giorgia Meloni, the Brothers of Italy leader, which has neo-fascist roots, and the League's Matteo Salvini have joined forces to demonstrate their "Italians First" nationalist agenda that vows to end mass migration into the country as a key aspect of their campaign.

The island of Lampedusa was Salvini's first destination on Sunday, which happens to be the landing point for tens of thousands of migrants each year from North Africa, where he stated that Lampedusa could not become "Europe's refugee camp," adding, "Only those with permission should enter Italy."

Meloni, on the other hand, explained that she differentiates between people fleeing conflict and persecution and those who are unusual economic migrants. Last month, however, she came under fire after she reposted a video of a woman being raped, allegedly by an asylum seeker in an unidentified Italian town, but the post was later removed for violating rules on social media. 

Maurizio Ambrosini, a sociologist at Milan University, commented, "Unfortunately our political debate associates immigrants with landings... creating the idea of huge flows... while the actual number of immigrants has been stable for a decade in Italy," but according to a YouGov survey last December across Europe, 77% of the population say immigration levels are "too high" which is 10 points above the EU average. 

See more: Italy’s far-right targets immigrants