Autonomist centre-right Valdotanian Union (UV, French acronym) won in Sunday for the eighth time in a row the election to the Council of the Valley (legislative chamber of Aosta Valley). UV won 33.5% of the popular vote and emerged again as the strongest single political party. The UV-led coalition (together with autonomist Stella Alpina and Autonomist Federation) gathered 47.9% of the vote and 18 out of 25 seats in the Council. This is enough for them to secure an absolute majority (13 seats for UV and 5 for Stella Alpina).

Nevertheless, the autonomist centre-right coalition has lost 14 percenage points if this year's result is compared to that of 2008. Then, the UV-led coalition womn almost 62% of the vote, which meant that the parties under it secured 23 seats.

Things are now different. Autonomist centre-left coalition has polled far better than in 2008: it has grown from 27.4% of the vote five years ago to 40.5% now. This coalition is made up of two pro-autonomy parties (Progressive Valdotanian Union, UVP, and Autonomy Liberty Participation Ecology, ALPE) and the main Italian centre-left partt (Democratic Party, PD). UVP has won 7 seats, ALPE 5 and PD 3.

Disaster for Grillo's and Berlusconi's parties

Beppe Grillo's Movement 5 Stars is one of the big losers of Sunday election. The grillini have won 6.6% of the vote, but in the last Italian election (held only three months ago) they reached 18.5% in Aosta Valley. Anyway, Grillo's party has secured 2 seats in Aosta Valley Council.

Results for Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom (PdL) have been even worse. PdL has only reached 4.1% of the vote, while in 2008 the party won 10.65%. Thus, PdL has lost all 4 seats it held in the Council. This is very bad news for the party, whose regional secretary Alberto Zucchi has resigned.

A moderate manifesto in national issues

UV standed for election with a quite moderate manifesto in national issues. The party did not even propose a reform of Aosta's Statute of Autonomy. UV rather proposed to fully uleash the potential of the current legal text. According to the manifesto, UV did not appear to introduce any great advance in favour of the own languages of Aosta.