I wasn’t too sure if I should vote or not.  I had only spent a short time looking at the candidates and what they basically stood for. Politics in this part of the world is a touchy subject.  Do I stick with the mainly German speaking side or look at the more Italian parties?

I mean it’s only the local council elections, nothing major, right?  Don’t believe that for a moment.  The election was two fold, a new mayor candidate and the party responsible for running the council.  Where I live, the majority is German speaking, over 91% with the remaining being Italian, Ladin and other languages including mine.  Being a mainly German-speaking village, the big party here is SVP (Südtiroler Volkspartei), fiercely South Tyrolean but not on the same level as the Südtirolrer Freiheit or Südtiroler Schützenbund.  These will be the subjects of a later blog.  Nonetheless we are a South Tyrolean village where any Italian party will struggle.  Thus the dilemma, what if none of the above parties represents your views, or are at odds with your views?  

One aspect that I found very interesting was that the police were present at the voting station.  Now this is something I had never experienced before.  I do not recall the police ever being at a voting station I used whilst in the UK.  That would have been a really strange thing to see.  Can you not trust your citizens to respectfully queue and vote?  It was a strange experience indeed.

Whilst waiting in line to vote, I thought that the process was not too dis-similar to that in the UK, apart from the police presence.  Why should it be though I thought?  As I got closer, I realised  that the polling staff were calling men and women separately.  This was strange I thought.  Then I realised that they had separate voting booths for men and women, now that was strange. Was this just in our voting area, I don’t know?  So I got to the desk, gave my ID card and was given the voting forms. 

Here was an alarming difference; the voting form for the parties was just a piece of paper with the party logos on, no other information.  Nothing.  No candidate or party names, nothing.  Just the party logos.  On the second form for the mayoral vote was also nothing.  Not even a logo, I was supposed to just write down the name of the candidate I wanted as a mayor.  What if I wanted to change my mind at the last minute, it is possible?  There were not even information sheets in the booth for that last minute check on the parties and people.  I always found that an important factor in UK elections. In the booth you had all the party information of who the candidate was and what they stood for.  That last reminder or chance to change your mind.

So I made my decision and popped the ballot in the box.  My experience of voting in Italy accomplished; an interesting experience that may be repeated and may not.