Giorgia Meloni, whose party won the election, announced Monday she would seek to head the next administration.
Giorgia Meloni is a strong supporter of the phrase "God, nation, and family," and she is poised to become Italy's first female prime minister by heading a right-wing coalition.
Meloni, head of the Brothers of Italy party, was a supporter of Benito Mussolini in the past. Together with Silvio Berlusconi's Forza Italia and the far-right League, she will lead Italy's most conservative administration since World War II.
Also, READ: In Pics: Meet Giorgia Meloni, once a waitress who is now set to be Italy's first female PM
Who is Giorgia Meloni?
As a young activist, Meloni would sneak out of her house at night to help put far-right posters throughout her Rome neighbourhood, engaging in a dangerous game of cat and mouse with her leftist opponents.
Now, 30 years later, she can spread her message openly without resorting to secret missions. Instead, her likeness is plastered all over billboards in every major city.
Meloni's meteoric ascent is inextricably linked to the evolution of her own party, the Brothers of Italy, which has emerged from obscurity into the political spotlight without completely denying its post-fascist past.
Meloni, now 45 years old, won her first municipal election at the age of 21, and at the age of 31 was appointed Italy's youngest ever minister with the youth portfolio in Berlusconi's 2008 administration, earning praise and criticism from supporters and detractors alike.
Her rise is even more remarkable when considering her modest beginnings in a nation where family connections are sometimes given more weight than talent. After her father abandoned the family shortly after her birth, she was raised by her mother in a poor neighbourhood of the Italian capital, and she has never made any effort to hide her pronounced Roman accent.
She was determined and outspoken, and it didn't take long for party organiser Fabio Rampelli to notice. Rampelli had been planning courses to educate the next generation of conservative politicians.
In the mid-1990s, the MSI was absorbed into a new organisation named National Alliance (AN), which later merged with a mainstream conservative organisation founded by former prime minister Berlusconi.
Giorgia Meloni does not linger on the fact that she is Italy's first female prime minister. She believes women should be promoted to executive positions based on their own merit and is thus against diversity quotas to increase the number of women in government and business. As a bonus, she notes that being a woman in traditionally male-dominated Italy has certain benefits.
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