The Italian parliament is set to be dissolved for early elections after Premier Mario Draghi resigned on Thursday following the collapse of his ruling coalition. Draghi quit after three of the big parties in his coalition, Matteo Salvini’s right-wing League, ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia (FI) and the 5-Star Movement (M5S), failed to take part in a vote of confidence in the Senate on a resolution backing him on Wednesday.
President Sergio Mattarella is meeting Lower House Speaker Roberto Fico and Senate Speaker Elisabetta Casellati later on Thursday to discuss the arrangements for the dissolution of parliament. The date has been set for September 25th to vote. There had been concerns that this could clash with a Jewish holiday, but the nation’s Jewish Community said Thursday that holding the election on this day would not be a problem for them.
The president’s office has said that the outgoing government will stay in office for everyday administration for the time being. Addressing the Lower House before meeting Mattarella to resign, the former president of the European Central Bank thanked the lawmakers present, most of whom had supported his government of national unity over the last year and a half. He appeared relaxed and cheerful, after tense moments on Wednesday during his reply to criticism of his call for the parties to renew the “pact of trust” that his government was based on, when he had to deny having asked to be given “full powers”.
“Sometimes even the hearts of central bankers get used,” he quipped, referring to a recent joke he made about a transplant recipient preferring the heart of a central banker to that of another donor because it had “never been used”. “Thank you for all the work done in this period,” he went on to state.
Draghi basically confirmed the resignation he presented last week when the M5S snubbed a confidence vote on a decree, sparking a government crisis. Mattarella initially refused to accept the resignation, telling Draghi to report to parliament, which he did on Wednesday. Draghi made an appeal to patch up his coalition on Wednesday after an array of calls for him to stay on, given the difficulties Italy currently faces, from business leaders, mayors, health workers and other groups. Among other things, Rome has more reforms to deliver to be able to get the next tranches of almost 200 billion euros in EU grants and low-interest loans for its post-COVID National Recovery and Resilience Plan (NRRP). “We are not like the others, we decided to choose [what’s best for] Italy,” said Enrico Letta, the leader of the center-left Democratic Party (PD). “Parliament went against the country, but we showed that we are focused on the interests of the country and the voters will rewards us.”
On Wednesday M5S leader and ex-premier Giuseppe Conte defended his movement’s role in the collapse of the government, saying Draghi had “shown us the door” by refusing to listen to their demands.
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