Municipal elections were held in Turin, Piedmont, on 5 June 2016 to elect the mayor of Turin and the 38 members of the City Council of Turin. Chiara Appendino, the candidate of the Five Star Movement (M5S), was elected after defeating former mayor Piero Fassino in the runoff election on 19 June. As a centre-left coalition stronghold that always elected a centre-left mayor since direct elections began in 1993, Fassino (who finished first in the first round by a comfortable margin) was considered the frontrunner and Appendino's win was an upset. Appendino's win also marked the first win for the M5S in a major Italian city and occurred during a wave of mayoral victories by the M5S in the 2016 Italian local elections.[1][2][3] The results were widely reported as a major breakthrough for the M5S, which had previously been seen as a protest party rather than a significant political force.[4]
The voting system for the office of mayor of Turin is used for all mayoral elections in Italy in the cities 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. As a result, the winning candidate can claim majority support, although it is not guaranteed. The election of the City Council of Turin is based on a direct choice for the candidate with a preference vote and the candidate with the majority of the preferences is elected. The number of the seats for each party is determined proportionally.[5]
Political parties and political candidates
Among the main candidates and coalitions that took part to the election were left-wing, centre-left, centrist, centre-right and right-wing coalitions, plus the M5S.[6]
According to the Italian electoral law of 1993 for the municipalities of Italy, if a defeated candidate for mayor obtains over 3% of votes, the mayoral candidate is automatically elected city councillor (in this case Fassino, Morano, Napoli, Rosso, and Airaudo were all elected). The candidate elected mayor votes on the city council but is not a member of it.
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