Giorgia Meloni named «Person of the Year» by Italian right-wing newspaper

The newspaper wrote about Ms. Meloni: “In times of war, we choose the one who has shown that he knows how to fight.” No. 39; Photo: ANDREAS SOLARO/AFP via Getty Images

A right-wing Italian daily sparked an outcry on Friday after it named the country's first female prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, as «person of the year.»

Libero posted on the front page stripe made a long tribute and placed a large portrait of the Prime Minister in a double-breasted white jacket with a determined look.

Under the headline «Person of the Year,» the article said Meloni had won the «war of the sexes» in Italy and had «not only broken the glass ceiling, but shattered it.»

The article was quickly perceived as a slight against political opponents and by women's rights activists who accused Ms Meloni of not doing enough to protect women from violence and of promoting regressive views about their role in society.

On Thursday, a senator from her party said that The “first desire” of a young woman should be to have a child.

The article was written by Mario Sechi, the newspaper's Rome bureau chief, who headed the Prime Minister's communications team from March to September 2023 before taking up his post at the daily.

“In our society of weak-minded people, we recognized strong ideas,” Mr. Ceci wrote.

“Due to excessive diversity, we have changed the gender. During the war, we chose the one who showed that he knew how to fight.”

The newspaper ran a lengthy tribute on the front page. Photo: Libero

Mr Ceci said the prime minister had to deal with two wars, multiple geopolitical upheavals, a changing Europe and a world order that is now being reinvented.

In October 2022, she was elected as the first female prime minister. Minister of Italy.

“Georgia Meloni for Libero is “person of the year” because, above all, she abolished the war of the sexes by winning it, by thinking differently, by being divergent, by overcoming the arrogance of men and the defeatism of women. She not only broke the glass ceiling, she destroyed it.»

«It's a capitulation.»

Ellie Schlein, secretary of the center-left Democratic Party, criticized the newspaper's editorial decision, saying the prime minister had abandoned Italian women.

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“Today a right-wing newspaper explains to us that politics and power belong to men,” Ms. Schlein said. “I don’t think my ambition as a politician is to become person of the year. On the contrary, I believe that this is capitulation.”

Elisabetta Piccolotti, MP for Alleanza Verdi e Sinistra (Green and Left Alliance), described the cover-up as “an affirmation of male superiority” and called on the Prime Minister to reject it.

“At this stage, Mr Prime Minister, please clarify , please: are you a woman, are you a man, or are you non-binary?” — Piccolotti wrote on Facebook.

However, Culture Minister Gennaro Sangiuliano, a former deputy director of the Libero, told reporters in Naples that the title of «Man of the Year» was well deserved, since he also received a note of the «barbarity» of «cancel culture» .

Since its election in 2022, the Meloni government has sought to protect the traditional family and national identity, protect cultural heritage and limit the arrival of migrants.

Ms Meloni is a single mother who recently separated from her partner, TV presenter Andrea Giambruno, is known for her strong stance on the concept of a traditional family.

She has been successful so far. no comments to Libero's article.