Italy’s Prime Minister Mario Draghi wants to resign. He said so on Thursday in Parliament.
Italy’s Prime Minister Mario Draghi wants to resign again because he sees no possibility of continuing to govern. “Against the background of last night’s vote in the Senate, I ask that the session be adjourned because I will go to the President of the Republic to inform him of my decision,” Draghi said on Thursday in the Chamber of Deputies in Rome. Earlier, there was long applause for Draghi before the start of the session. Many MPs stood up. Draghi thanked the parliamentarians with a “Grazie”.
On Wednesday evening in the Senate, the smaller of the two chambers of parliament, the 74-year-old head of government missed his goal of gaining broad approval from his governing parties in a vote of confidence. The left-wing populist Five Star Movement, the right-wing populist Lega and the conservative Forza Italia did not vote.
The non-party economist wanted to appear in the Chamber of Deputies on Thursday. In the Senate, the other chamber of parliament, on Wednesday he called on his governing parties to continue to support him and to form a new “pact of trust” with him.
However, the centre-right bloc of his multi-party government of pundits and politicians was only willing to do so if the Five Star Movement were excluded from a new government. The star senators, on the other hand, expected Draghi to agree with them on their political proposals for a sequel, but from their point of view he did not do so.
Draghi should see no way out than to offer his resignation again. He did just that a week ago when the Five Stars in the Senate did not vote in favor of him in a vote on an aid package. President Sergio Mattarella rejected the request at the time. If he accepts it now, he could hire someone to form a governing majority in the existing parliament, or he could dissolve the two chambers, which would initiate a snap election. This must then be done within 70 days. Therefore, a possible election date would be between the end of September and the beginning of October.
Without Draghi, Italy lacks an important guarantor of stability in Europe. The independent economist was asked by Mattarella in mid-February 2021 to form a government majority. The second cabinet of the current head of the Five Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, had previously fallen apart. Draghi set his government the goal of guiding Italy safely through the corona pandemic and securing the country the important billions in aid for the EU recovery fund from Brussels.
In the second half of 2022, Italy must implement important reforms so that Brussels can distribute the next tranche of the Corona reconstruction aid worth billions. In addition, Parliament has to plan the budget for 2023, which usually takes a long time. In the event of a new election, the country would initially hardly be able to act politically, and that in times of rising inflation and energy prices – caused by the Ukraine war.
