Salvini is masterminding his comeback

Bloomberg

Cultivating an image of just another average guy has served Matteo Salvini well, turning the leader of what used to be a fringe nationalist party into Italy’s most prominent politician, the chief opponent of immigrants and Brussels interference. Mobbed wherever he goes, few dispute he will one day become the country’s PM.
That, though, is for public consumption and there’s another side to the man known only to his inner circle, the lieutenants for whom he is simply known as “The Captain” and who in private describe a man who’s dead serious, a sophisticated thinker with dogged ambition.
And it’s that side of Salvini that ultimately poses the biggest threat to the European order should he complete his rise to the top of Italian politics.
His latest target is Emilia-Romagna, a center-left stronghold that the leader of the League planned to flip in Sunday’s local election. The contest in the prosperous region is his best chance to deal the government a body blow. Polls show Salvini’s League and the Democratic Party tied but with the recent turmoil in government, a win for Salvini would be especially sweet.
Away from the backroom strategising, it was the well-rehearsed public persona that was on full display last week in Maranello, the home of Ferrari but more crucially a key town in business-rich Emilia-Romagna.
Salvini was in his element. As he made his way along barriers in front of the stage on the main square, people reached out to stroke him.
Sporting a Ferrari-red windbreaker after his speech in Maranello, Salvini cheerfully greeted a supporter waiting to meet him on stage. There is always a handshake. Then he takes the fan’s mobile phone and snaps a selfie with them. It takes less than 10 seconds.
“Salvini exploits the territory, television and social media to put himself constantly in the public eye,” said Giovanni Orsina, head of the school of government at Rome’s LUISS university. “He’s projecting a reassuring image that says ‘I am one of you, I like you, I’m with you.’”
The League leader still faces the challenge of how to engineer the collapse of a government from the outside especially when those inside are determined to dig further in—if only to keep him out.