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ROME — Italy’s Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte has pleaded with Europhile MPs to save his government ahead of a vote in parliament that will determine whether his troubled coalition can cling to power.
Conte faces votes in the Chamber of Deputies on Monday and the Senate on Tuesday after former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi took his Italia Viva party out of the governing coalition because of disagreements over the country’s post-coronavirus economic recovery plan.
Conte, who is not a member of a political party but leads a coalition of the anti-establishment 5Star Movement and the center-left Democratic Party, appealed to parliament on Monday for “clear and transparent support” from “forces in the highest, noblest political tradition: pro-European, liberal, of the people, socialist” and against those “with nationalist ideas.”
Their support would “enrich” the government, he said.
Conte claimed that his government has shown great responsibility in the face of “an epochal challenge.” While admitting it had made mistakes, he said the Cabinet had always acted honorably, to protect the people, and that “we can hold our heads high.”
He said he had “not seen any plausible basis for the crisis,” which he said was “incomprehensible to citizens battling the fear of illness and socio-economic disadvantages” and “risks making politicians look like they have lost touch with reality.”
The crisis has “opened a deep wound,” he said, and risked increasing the cost of Italy’s borrowing and damaging its reputation abroad. “We cannot go back but we can turn the page,” Conte said.
Conte is expected to get at least enough support in the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of parliament, to form a minority government. But success in the upper house, the Senate, is far from certain after attempts to lure centrists from the opposition benches appear to have failed.
By optimistic counts, he is four short of an absolute majority of 161, although timing could be everything. As one former minister commented, “responsible MPs … pop up when you least expect them.” One of the six life senators, 90-year-old Holocaust survivor Liliana Segre, has returned from effective retirement to support Conte with her vote.
Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio, de facto leader of the largest coalition party, the 5Stars, said the government could continue as a minority government, saying that an “absolute majority is only needed for [votes on] budget changes and very few other acts. And when we need [support], we will find it,” he told Corriere della Sera.
Renzi’s party has already agreed to back the most pressing legislation, a budget adjustment allowing businesses to receive compensation for losses during lockdown.
But a government without an absolute majority would be weak and vulnerable to collapse at any time.
Close Renzi ally and Italia Viva MP Maria Elena Boschi said Monday that the party would return to the coalition if its policy demands were met.
Italia Viva insists that the government make use of some of the €36 billion in loans on offer from the eurozone’s bailout fund, known as the European Stability Mechanism (ESM), to help improve the health service. “We would support a government that was clear on what needs to be done for the country,” Boschi said.
But using the fund is a red line for the 5Stars, for whom dismantling the ESM has been a fundamental policy since its early, Euroskeptic days.
And both 5Stars and the Democrats have said they can no longer work with Renzi, calling him “untrustworthy.”
Yet there’s little appetite from the governing partners to hold an election, as they are struggling in the polls and because a referendum last year agreed to cut the number of lawmakers in parliament by a third after the next national ballot.
If Conte fails to get a majority in both chambers, he must resign. President Sergio Mattarella could still, however, ask Conte to try and form a new government. The president could also ask someone else to try and reunite the governing majority, or he could give power to a technocratic leader to guide the country until elections can be held.
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