Read news from:
Austria
SHARE
COPY LINK

POLITICS

Italy begins second attempt to form government

Far-right and anti-establishment forces in Italy resumed battle on Thursday over who can lead a new government, as a second round of talks began with a row over Silvio Berlusconi leaving little room for manoeuvre after last month's inconclusive election.

Published: 12 April 2018 16:11 CEST
Italy begins second attempt to form government
Guards outside the room in the presidential palace where Italy's latest government talks are taking place. Photo: Andreas Solaro/AFP

Five Star Movement (M5S) leader Luigi Di Maio and Matteo Salvini, head of the nationalist League party, will meet Italian President Sergio Mattarella for consultations at the presidential palace on Thursday afternoon.

The talks began in the morning in Rome with the smallest groups in the Italian parliament.

READ ALSO: What to expect from Italy's government talks

The M5S is Italy's largest single party after picking up just under 33 percent of the vote in the March 4th election.

Salvini's right-wing coalition, which includes Berlusconi's Forza Italia party, is the largest group with 37 percent.

Both Di Maio and Salvini have said that they are ready to govern with one another but Di Maio is demanding that Salvini break his alliance with media magnate Berlusconi, something the 45-year-old League leader has so far refused to do.

Salvini will present a united right-wing front on Thursday, going to meet Mattarella with Berlusconi and his other coalition partner Giorgia Meloni – leader of the far-right Brothers of Italy party – after the three went separately to the first round of talks last week.

READ ALSO: Who is Italian President Sergio Mattarella? The man guiding Italy through rocky government talks

Who is Italian President Sergio Mattarella? The man guiding Italy through rocky government talks
Sergio Mattarella pictured during government consultations in early April. Photo: Alberto Pizzoli/AFP

Salvini needs to keep his coalition intact for regional elections on April 29th in northeastern Friuli-Venezia Giulia where the League is aiming for victory. In order to win, it has to maintain its alliance with Forza Italia.

On Wednesday Alessandro Di Battista, an important figure within the M5S, said Berlusconi represented everything that was wrong with Italy.

“They are the words of the many people who believe that Berlusconi belongs to the political past,” Di Maio said on current affairs programme Porta a Porta.

However, an agreement between Di Maio and Salvini is currently the best hope for a working parliamentary majority.

The Democratic Party (PD), the big loser of the election after its centre-left coalition gained just under 23 percent of the vote, has been courted by the M5S. The League has refused categorically to work with the PD.

READ ALSO: 400 women in Italy's Democratic Party protest 'boys' club' culture

The PD is deeply divided between those who prefer to remain in opposition rather than prop up a Di Maio government – a faction led by former prime minister Matteo Renzi – and those who want dialogue to stop the far-right League gaining power.

The issue may not be decided until April 21st, when the PD will choose a new leader after Renzi's post-election resignation.

The M5S chief whip in the Chamber Giulia Grillo told Il Fatto Quotidiano newspaper on Thursday that “up to now the PD has not wanted any dialogue”.

On Friday Mattarella will meet the speakers of both houses of the Italian parliament and his predecessor Giorgio Napolitano.

Mattarella could give one of the trio an exploratory mandate to try to move the discussions forward, or plan a third round of consultations.

READ ALSO:

By Terry Daley

EU

Italy’s Meloni hopes EU ‘understands message’ from voters

Italy's Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni said Saturday she hoped the European Union would understand the "message" sent by voters in last weekend's elections, after far-right parties such as hers made gains.

Published: 15 June 2024 17:33 CEST
Italy's Meloni hopes EU 'understands message' from voters

Meloni, head of the post-fascist Brothers of Italy party, which performed particularly well in the vote, urged the EU to “understand the message that has come from European citizens”.

“Because if we want to draw lessons from the vote that everything was fine, I fear it would be a slightly distorted reading,” she told a press conference at the end of a G7 summit in Puglia.

“European citizens are calling for pragmatism, they are calling for an approach that is much less ideological on several major issues,” she said.

Meloni’s right-wing government coalition has vehemently opposed the European Green Deal and wants a harder stance on migration.

“Citizens vote for a reason. It seems to me that a message has arrived, and it has arrived clearly,” she said.

EU leaders will meet in Brussels on Monday to negotiate the top jobs, including whether European Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen will get a second term.

Von der Leyen’s centre-right European People’s Party strengthened its grip with the vote, but her reconfirmation is not yet in the bag.

The 65-year-old conservative was in Puglia for the G7 and likely used the summit to put her case to the leaders of France, Germany and Italy.

But Meloni refused to be drawn on whom she is backing.

“We will have a meeting on Monday, we’ll see,” she told journalists.

“We will also see what the evaluations will be on the other top roles,” she said.

Italian political watchers say Meloni is expected to back von der Leyen, but is unlikely to confirm that openly until Rome locks in a deal on commissioner jobs.

“What interests me is that… Italy is recognised for the role it deserves,” she said.

“I will then make my assessments.”

Italian Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani indicated that it was unlikely any decision would be made before the French elections on June 30 and July 7.

SHOW COMMENTS