Tonight, at 20.30 on Sky (curiously in the same Assago studio where X Factor is filmed) the more or less awaited television confrontation between the five candidates for the centre-left primaries is broadcast: the secretary of the Pd Pierluigi Bersani, the mayor of Florence Matteo Renzi, Bruno Tabacci, Laura Puppato and the leader of Sel Nichi Vendola.
The rules of confrontation have been clearly established, and enforcing them will be the task of the conductor Gianluca Semprini, who will ask the candidates four questions, the same for each one, on four different topics. The response time is one and a half minutes, with the possibility for the contenders to ask three times for the possibility of a one-minute reply. There will then be flash questions for each, and one question for each candidate, posed by a supporter of another of the aspiring prime ministers.
At the end of the debate each candidate will be able to address the voter-listener (the boundary between the two categories is not clear) a minute and a half appeal. Should one of the rivals be quoted during this appeal, he could make use of a one-minute reply.
On the fringes of contention are found the outsiders Tabacci and Puppato, not credited with any chance of winning, while attention is focused on the other three candidates. Favorite Bersani, of course, has the most to lose from this confrontation, e he will have to beware of Renzi's overbearing run-up and the rhetorical ability of Nichi Vendola, which, in terms of primaries, has an undoubtedly enviable curriculum.
Bersani would have insisted that the debate be held on the Sky platform, refusing other squares (Mentana and Fazio) more accessible to spectators. According to the malignant ones, the decision (on which a sterile controversy has mounted in recent days) would be due to the almost paradoxical intention of containing the audience, since, according to the polls, a low turnout would favor the secretary of the Pd, while with a higher turnout the mayor of Florence would take the lead.
The most serious risk, however, is to show voters a coalition fighting within it, revealing itself irreparably split, divided into a thousand different souls who harbor their mutual grievances and try to outdo each other. Beyond the share, low or high, this would be the real defeat for the center-left.
