The head of the Five Star Movement is increasingly sawing into Prime Minister Draghi’s power base and is threatening to overthrow the government. Trial by Fire will be a vote of confidence this week.
One of the hottest weeks of the year has begun for Mario Draghi, and it’s not because of the Roman July heatwaves. The temperatures within his coalition are dangerously close to boiling point, where the largest party is currently making work difficult for the prime minister: the next few days should decide whether Giuseppe Conte’s five-star movement dares the total crash and in the middle of the Ukraine war, despite gas shortages and Economic crisis, risking the fall of Draghi’s all-party government. And thus shaken the whole of Europe, since early elections would again destabilize the powerful euro and NATO country.
How great the tensions are was already evident on Monday: In the evening, the prime minister spoke with Head of State Sergio Mattarella for almost an hour after the five-star in the Chamber of Deputies boycotted a vote on aid measures. The real acid test in the next few days is the Senate vote on the package for companies, employees, families and pensioners, which Draghi (once again) links to the vote of confidence. The package is urgently awaited. Because the consequences of the Ukraine war are increasing the poverty rate, which had already reached record levels as a result of the pandemic: According to the statistics agency Istat, 9.4 percent of the population in Italy live in absolute poverty, with young people being particularly affected.