Venetian independence referendum, 2014

Venetian independence referendum, 2014
Map of Italy with Veneto highlighted in red.
Location	Veneto, Italy
Date	16–21 March 2014
Voting system	Simple majority, online voting
Do you want Veneto to be a federal, independent and sovereign state?
Yes    89.1% No    10.9% Turnout was 63.2%.
Should Veneto adopt the Euro as its currency if it becomes independent?
Yes    51.4% No    48.6% Turnout was 24.6%.
Should Veneto seek to join the European Union if it becomes independent?
Yes    55.7% No    44.3% Turnout was 22.3%.
Should Veneto seek to join NATO if it becomes independent?
Yes    64.5% No    35.5% Turnout was 19.8%.

The Venetian independence referendum of 2014 was an unofficial, non-binding, online and privately organised poll held among residents of Veneto, one of the 20 regions of Italy, 16–21 March 2014. The vote, known also as the "digital plebiscite" or "Plebiscito.eu", was promoted by Plebiscite 2013, a Venetian nationalist organisation led by Gianluca Busato.

According to Plebiscito.eu's staff, 2.36 million Venetians (63.2% of all eligible voters) participated in the online referendum and 89.1% of them (that is to say 56.6% of all eligible voters) voted "yes" to independence. P2013 proclaimed Veneto's independence from Italy in Treviso on the night of 21 March.

In the poll, ten "delegates for independence" were elected: Busato was the preferred candidate with 135,306 votes, followed by Stefano Vescovi (48,320), Selena Veronese (46,947), Silvia Gandin (43,025), Lodovico Pizzati (25,731), Gianfranco Favaro (16,670), Raffaele Serafini (16,627), Manuel Carraro (16,627), Gianluca Panto (16,321) and Paolo Bernardini (16,299).

Finally, voters were asked to express their opinion on three "foreign policy issues", were Veneto to become independent: adoption of the Euro (supported by 51.4% of voters), accession to European Union membership (supported by 55.7% of voters) and accession to NATO membership (supported by 64.5% of voters); turnout was however much lower for these three questions (24.6%, 22.3% and 19.8%, respectively).

Turnout and results were questioned by many news sources based on publicly available website traffic statistics released by Alexa Internet and similar providers. According to the critics, throughout the duration of the poll, the website received approximately 135,000 visits (just 3.6% of eligible voters). Moreover, a significant proportion of this traffic came from outside Italy, with 10% coming from Santiago, Chile alone.

According to an opinion poll by Ilvo Diamanti's Demos&Pi for La Repubblica taken on 20–21 March, however, 48% of Venetians had voted or had intention to vote in the online referendum, 49% had not voted, and 3% did not answer. Among those voting, 78% favoured independence. Moreover, Diamanti found that 55% of all eligible voters favoured independence, which was opposed by 39%. Other polling firms, including Ixè and Istituto Piepoli, offered comparable data.