Protest parties win elections in Italy

rome - After counting the votes in most constituencies, it is clear that the populist and Eurosceptic parties are the big winners of the Italian parliamentary elections.

According to the official standings of the Ministry of the Interior, the Eurosceptic Five Star movement is the largest party. The protest party of Luigi Di Maio stands for more than 32 percent of the votes.

The coalition of right-wing parties has a total of about 37 percent of the votes. Of that coalition, the right-wing populist Lega (formerly Lega Nord) of Matteo Salvini achieves 17.6 percent. The conservative Forza Italia of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi is on 14 percent of the vote.

The center-left alliance under the leadership of the Democratic Party (PD) of current Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni could in total count on about 23 percent of the votes. The PD, which is headed by former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, receives about 19 percent of the votes.

According to these figures, no party or alliance has a government majority. To obtain a majority in parliament, a block requires about 40 percent of the votes.