1997 Rome municipal election

1997 Rome mayoral election

16 November 1997
Turnout	74.0%
Candidate Francesco Rutelli Pierluigi Borghini Party Greens National Alliance Popular vote 985,361 586,083 Percentage 60.4% 35.9%
Mayor before election Francesco Rutelli Greens Elected mayor Francesco Rutelli Greens

Municipal elections were held in Rome on 16 November 1997 to elect the Mayor of Rome and 60 members of the City Council.

As a result of the election the outgoing Mayor Francesco Rutelli was re-elected on the first round with the 60% of votes.

Background

The 1996 general elections showed a strong performance by the centre-left coalition, especially in the city of Rome. Since that moment the political support to leftist parties in the Eternal City started to increase heavily, although the former-fascist National Alliance (AN) party continued to maintain a huge number of supporters across the city.

Mayoral election

The centre-right coalition was led by Pierluigi Borghini, a famous conservative businessman, while the centre-left governmental coalition was led by the outgoing Mayor Francesco Rutelli.

Voting system

The voting system is used for all mayoral elections in Italy, in the city with a population higher than 15,000 inhabitants. Under this system voters express a direct choice for the mayor or an indirect choice voting for the party of the candidate's coalition. If no candidate receives 50% of votes, the top two candidates go to a second round after two weeks. This gives a result whereby the winning candidate may be able to claim majority support, although it is not guaranteed.

The election of the City Council is based on a direct choice for the candidate with a preference vote: the candidate with the majority of the preferences is elected. The number of the seats for each party is determined proportionally.

Results

Candidate		Party	Coalition	First round
				Votes	%
	Francesco Rutelli	FdV	The Olive Tree	985,361	60.44
	Pierluigi Borghini	AN	Pole for Freedoms	586,083	35.95
	Pino Rauti	MS-FT		26,366	1.62
	Others			52,818	2.02
Eligible voters				2,302,474	100.00
Voted				1,704,650	74.04
Blank or invalid ballots				69,636
Total valid votes				1,635,014

Summary of the 1997 Rome City Council election results

Parties and coalitions				Votes	%	Seats
	style="background-color:Template:Democratic Party of the Left/meta/color" |	Democratic Party of the Left (Partito Democratico della Sinistra)	PDS	280,468	22.0%	15
	style="background-color:Template:Communist Refoundation Party/meta/color" |	Communist Refoundation Party (Rifondazione Comunista)	PRC	112,014	8.8%	6
		Rutelli List (Lista Rutelli)	LR	89,279	7.0%	5
	style="background-color:Template:Federation of the Greens/meta/color" |	Federation of the Greens (Federazione dei Verdi)	FdV	82,785	6.5%	4
		Italian People's Party (Partito Popolare Italiano)	PPI	70,597	5.5%	3
	style="background-color:Template:Independent (politician)/meta/color" |	Others		96,734	7.5%	3
Rutelli coalition (Centre-left)				731,877	57.4%	36
	style="background-color:Template:National Alliance (Italy)/meta/color" |	National Alliance (Alleanza Nazionale)	AN	306,964	24.1%	15
	style="background-color:Template:Forza Italia/meta/color" |	Forza Italia	FI	128,397	10.0%	6
	style="background-color:Template:Union of the Centre/meta/color" |	Christian Democratic Centre (Centro Cristiano Democratico)	CCD	47,435	3.7%	2
	style="background-color:Template:Independent (politician)/meta/color" |	Others		9,437	1.0%	0
Borghini coalition (Centre-right)				492,233	38.6%	23
	Tricolour Flame (Fiamma Tricolore)		MS-FT	23,227	1.8%	1
style="background-color:Template:Independent politician/meta/color" |	Others			28,000	2.1%	0
Total				1,275,337	100%	60
Votes cast / turnout				1,704,650	74.0%
Registered voters				2,302,474
Source: Ministry of the Interior