Mario Draghi announced his resignation in the evening

Mario Draghi, president of the Italian Council, announced his resignation at the Council of Ministers on Thursday evening. ” I would like to inform you that I will submit my resignation letter to the President this evening. Sergio Mattarella, Mr. Draghi, according to the comments reported in a press release from his services. Thus ended the conflict between the President of the Council and the leader of the Five Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte. After days of verbal threats and failed mediations, the leader of the 5-Star Movement broke with the majority, which has been in a kind of bind since February 2021.Government of National Unity All the country’s political forces except the nationalist Fratelli d’Italia party.

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On Thursday, as the Senate voted on a $23 billion aid package for families and businesses that included a vote of confidence in the government, Five Star senators walked out of the half-cycle without taking part in a confidence vote requested by executives. Nevertheless, Mario Draghi no longer has the large majority that supported his government if the confidence was voted in with 172 votes.

The Milan stock market fell as much as 4%. The 10-year yield spread with the German Bund rose to 210 basis points, a sign of market anxiety over a return to political instability in Italy as the country grapples with a crisis situation. Associated with rising energy prices. And a massive investment plan of nearly 200 billion euros, partly financed by Europe, is to be set up over the next few years.

In the wake of the political crisis, a pretext was introduced in the aid project to allow a waste incinerator to be built in Rome, a project the M5S has been fighting for months as expensive, polluting and inefficient. . “The M5S has supported this government since its inception with two pillars: environmental change and social justice. “, Thursday Giuseppe Conte, who is not a senator, still reasoned. “We’ll give our votes for anything in the world if the provisions against climate change create a compulsion and threat to enter into a mandate that does nothing.. »

However, the day before yesterday, Giuseppe Conte did not want to bring down the government. To find more weight in the majority, he sent Mario Draghi a week ago a list of nine points of his conditions so that the movement would have a majority, the establishment of a minimum wage (which does not exist in Italy) and a set of measures in favor of poor families. He hoped to win his case on every point, and to score small victories to establish his legitimacy in front of his MPs and last five-star voters. So his break-up gesture is seen as incomprehensible at a time when the government is implementing a massive aid package to benefit families and businesses, and preparing to adopt a minimum wage and income policy to benefit the working poor. If he thinks he can regain control of the situation and avoid the government’s descent into extremism, Giuseppe Conte seems to have been overtaken by his radical base.

This hypocrisy is illustrated by the desperate attempt of Giuseppe Conte to raise the 5-Star Movement in the polls: elected as the first political force in the Parliament in 2018, with 34% of the votes, this movement, one after another, has betrayed all its originals. The protests have seen the usual erosion of its voter base, which has so far not exceeded its target of 11 to 12% voter turnout for the next assembly elections. If each local ballot proves to be one more step towards destruction, in Parliament, the base of elected officials has shrunk significantly with many departures to other parliamentary groups and, more recently, after the split of elected officials, behind the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Luigi Di Maio, the Insieme per il Futuro “movement to create an IPF group”. He left.The Five Star leaders have been plotting for months to open up the crisis to end Draghi’s government, explained yesterday Luigi Di. Mayo.They were hoping to lift the polls after a nine-month election campaign, but they condemned the country’s descent into economic and social decline. »

Nevertheless, Mario Draghi, who has a majority in the number of elected members in both houses, feels that he does not have a large majority on which to base this government. Two days ago, he explained in a press conference that the government cannot survive without the 5 Star Movement. But be that as it may, he has no question of leading a government under constant threat from elements of the majority. The main thing for him is functional, not durable.

So the President of the Council went to the Quirinal shortly after the senators’ votes had been counted, as he had promised. After nearly an hour of talks with President Sergio Mattarella, his decision was made.