On the day after the greatest political triumph by a woman in post-war Italy, let's take a look at some of the male competitors and predecessors of Giorgia Meloni, the presumed new head of government.

All four of the former prime ministers who were ousted while in office and attempted a political comeback on Sunday failed again in their own way.

At most, they have achieved only half victories for themselves and their parties.

Matthias Rub

Political correspondent for Italy, the Vatican, Albania and Malta based in Rome.

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The fact that figures such as Silvio Berlusconi, Matteo Renzi, Enrico Letta and Giuseppe Conte keep trying after supposedly final falls is a major reason why Italian voters are happy to entrust the country's political leadership to a "new face" and an unused political force .

Giorgia Meloni is this new face as the winner of the hour, and her right-wing conservative party, the Brothers of Italy, is the only political force of any size that has not been involved in any of the three governing coalitions since the last elections in 2018.

The voters rewarded this constancy and supposed consistency with a jump of around four percent in the 2018 elections to a good 26 percent now.

Letta resigns from party leadership

The worst day after the election was experienced by Enrico Letta, party leader of the Social Democrats and Prime Minister from 2013 to 2014. After an unconvincing election campaign and a moderate election result of 19 percent of the votes - in fact the same result as in the 2018 elections - Letta announced on Montag, he will not apply again for the party chairmanship.

He blamed "fire from his own ranks" for his decision, but did not name the shooters.

It is possible that the party congress, which is scheduled for March, will now be brought forward, because Letta is an opposition leader with no future after the announcement of his resignation.

After many years of “political exile” in Paris, Letta was elected leader of the Social Democrats in March 2021.

In a duel with the popular Meloni, the somewhat clumsy academic could not assert himself.

For Letta, the major project for the renewal of the party after the Social Democrats lost power in the 2018 elections included the creation of a "campo largo", a broad alliance of all forces of the political left - namely with the left-wing populist Five Star Movement, who triumphed in the March 2018 elections.

But after the fall of Prime Minister Mario Draghi on July 21, which the Five Stars had played a key role in initiating and ultimately helped implement, Letta's idea of ​​"broad field" died.

Never again with the five stars was Letta's creed from then on, although the Social Democrats and Five Stars had initially formed a fairly stable coalition from September 2019 to February 2021 in the second government of Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte.