Referendum in Italy: Citizens called to vote on naturalization and labor law

A non-EU resident with no marriage or blood ties to Italy must currently live in the country for ten years before applying for naturalization, a process that can then take years. The proposal, submitted to a referendum, proposes reducing this period to five years, which would bring Italy into line with Germany and France.

Supporters of the "yes" vote claim that up to 2.5 million people could benefit from this reform, which is supported by the Democratic Party (PD, center-left), the main opposition force.

The initiative for this referendum, which came from opposition parties and NGOs, had collected more than 500,000 signatures last September, as required by law.

Italians are invited to vote this Sunday, June 8 and Monday, June 9, 2025, in a referendum on a measure aimed at facilitating the acquisition of nationality.

Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, leader of the far-right Fratelli d'Italia (FDI) party, which came to power in 2022 on an anti-migrant platform, said she was "absolutely against" the measure. The parties in her coalition urged their voters to stay away from the polls, as a turnout of more than 50% is required for the vote to be valid.

For Giorgia Meloni, the current nationality law is "excellent" and "very open." "We are one of the European nations with the highest number of naturalizations," she stressed Thursday. According to Eurostat, Rome granted Italian nationality to 213,500 people in 2023, one-fifth of all naturalizations in the European Union.

In March, the government restricted access to naturalization by blood relationship , making only foreigners with Italian grandparents or parents eligible, whereas previously ancestry could be traced back to great-great-grandparents.

Even if the "yes" vote wins, the rule that children born in Italy to foreign parents cannot apply for citizenship before the age of 18 will remain unchanged.

Rapper Ghali , who is very popular in the country and was born in Milan to Tunisian parents, urged his fans to vote. "Some were born here, have lived here for years, (...) feel Italian in every way, but are not recognized as citizens," he denounced on Instagram, calling for a "yes" vote in the referendum because "we are asking that five years of life be enough (...) to be part of this country."

Employee protection

Italians are also called to vote on Sunday and Monday, again by referendum, on a proposal to abolish four laws liberalizing the labor market , a consultation wanted by the CGIL union (left), the country's main trade union confederation, which has also collected the 500,000 signatures necessary for the vote to be held.

The union hopes to restore protections against precarious contracts, dismissals and workplace accidents that had been removed in the past.

"We want to reverse a culture that has put the interests of business ahead of those of workers," Maurizio Landini, secretary general of the CGIL, told AFP.

The Democratic Party supports this change, although it adopted some of the measures proposed for abolition when it was in power, including some implemented by former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi.

Currently at 23% in the polls, far behind Ms Meloni who remains stable at around 30%, the PD is trying, with this new positioning, to recover part of the working class vote.