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Italy: crucial Senate vote for the future of the Conte government

2021-01-19T04:10:45.317Z


After having obtained confidence in the Chamber of Deputies, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte must find a majority in the upper house on Tuesday.


The Italian Senate is organizing a vote of confidence on Tuesday January 19 that is crucial for the future of the government of Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, released by Matteo Renzi and his troops, and therefore forced to find a new majority in the midst of a pandemic.

After having obtained confidence in the Chamber of Deputies on Monday, where the two pillars of his coalition, the Democratic Party (PD, center left) and the 5 Star Movement (M5S, anti-system), have the majority, Conte will attempt the double at the upper house, where it lacks on paper fifteen votes to reach the absolute majority.

Read also: Renzi withdraws his support for the Italian government

Giuseppe Conte, a law professor who himself has never rubbed shoulders with universal suffrage, has embarked on a frantic hunt for votes in the ranks of the centrists and non-members to try to compensate for the departure of Matteo Renzi and its fifteen senators.

“In all likelihood, Conte will gain confidence in the Senate as well.

We do not know with how many votes, probably without the absolute majority of 161 votes, but this is not essential for the survival of a government, ”

said Giovanni Orsina, political scientist at the Roman University of Luiss.

"This means that the Conte government will survive, but with a smaller majority, therefore with a more significant weakness in Parliament."

The future of Giuseppe Conte at the head of the executive would therefore not be threatened in the short term, but his room for maneuver could be singularly reduced, while Italy faces its most serious economic recession since the post- war, consequence of the pandemic which killed more than 82,000 people in the peninsula.

"The future of the country will depend on the choices that everyone will make in these serious hours

," he warned Monday before the deputies.

Towards early legislative elections?

The Prime Minister

“will seek in the weeks to come to enlarge this majority, by using for example the ministerial posts made available”

by the departure of the ministers of the party of Renzi, analyzes Giovanni Orsina.

A prospect that is still very hypothetical at this stage, believes Wolfgango Piccoli, of the Teneo consulting firm.

"Conte could end up at the helm of an extremely precarious majority which risks collapsing in the first vote which

[it]

would divide"

, he analyzes.

In fact, if Matteo Renzi made the commitment that his troops would abstain, the support of Giuseppe Conte will have to be counted and the chief executive is not sure of being able to maintain himself if his majority turns out to be too narrow.

In this case, three scenarios emerge: the PD and the M5S could come to terms with Renzi and form a reshuffled government, with or without Conte at its head.

A grand coalition could also emerge, led by an institutional, non-partisan figure.

Finally, in the event of an impasse, legislative elections would be called.

However, none of the members of the current coalition has an interest in early legislative elections, because it is the alliance between the right of Silvio Berlusconi (Forza Italia) and the extreme right - the League of Matteo Salvini and Fratelli of Italia by Georgia Meloni - who is given overwhelmingly favorite.

Read also: Italy: "For Salvini, the quarrel within the current majority is a tremendous boon"

The current government crisis was caused by the former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi (2014-2016), who notably criticizes Conte for the content of the stimulus program of 222.9 billion euros drawn from the mega plan of 750 billion euros. euros adopted in the summer of 2020 by European leaders and of which Italy is the main beneficiary.

He accuses him of aligning himself with the M5S and of

“squandering public money”

by granting tax rebates and ad hoc aid for electoral reasons instead of taking advantage of this windfall to invest and reform structurally.

Matteo Renzi also complains of not being listened to by Giuseppe Conte and calls for more weight in his government.

Source: lefigaro

All news articles on 2021-01-19

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