Italy: bad news accumulates for Mario Draghi and his government hangs in the balance

The political crisis endangers the stability of the Prime Minister Mario Draghi in the face of the assault of the same shareholders in the Executive Italian. The bad news is piling up due to inflation went from zero to 8% due to the crisis inflamed by the pandemic and the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

There are already 13 million poor people between absolute and relative wages are bad because in 30 years they have decreased by 3% while in France and Germany they have grown by 30%.

Furthermore, it is registered the worst drought in 70 years and goes to water rationing. Life is much more expensive and it is estimated that in 2023 the country could enter a severe economic recession.

The experience of the government “over the parties” is seriously at risk, with the solitary right-wing opposition Brothers of Italy, which leads Giorgia Meloni well and which leads the preferences in the polls with 23.4% of consensus.

Mario Draghi descended from the skies of world finance as former president of the European Central Bank in February last year and kicked off a difficult reconstruction of Italy hit by the pandemic.

was undertaken a successful recovery plan after the disastrous 8.9% decline in the economy in 2020 due to the pandemic that has paralyzed the country.

summer and pandemic

Millions of Italians went on vacation this summer and believe that the Covid virus, which continues to afflict the world, is a ghost of the past, but a new wave of infections denies them. In the past two days, it has varied between 103,000 and 135,000 infected. The daily deaths reach the hundred.

The government allowed people to ditch their masks and flock to beaches and mountains. Now he has to face reality because the northern autumn promises a new mourning in September-October.

The war in Ukraine multiplies the headaches. The world economy is headed for a recession that could lead to a recession.

That’s enough. The two large populist parties that more than four years ago won the political elections, which will be repeated in June 2023 to renew the Chamber and the Senate, which in turn elects and votes the governments and the President of the Republic, say so.

The “over the parties” pact amasses the government left and right and is based on lasting support until next year’s election is nominated. If that premise is broken, everything jumps. Draghi has already warned that if he falls he will not return.

divided government

Polls show that the political crisis receives key stimulus from the decline of the two largest populist parties. Matteo Salvini’s League and Giuseppe Conte’s Movimento 5 Stelle had collected just over 50% of the votes in the 2018 legislative elections and have now lost practically half, with 25.5%.

La Liga fell from 34.5% to 14.7%. The 5 Star Movement is worse off: it had the main parliamentary representation, which it has now lost to him internal divisions. And in the polls it drops to 11.4% of preferences.

These data explain why the two populist forces that formed a common government in 2018 are the engines of government destabilization. Especially the 5 Star Movement, which has openly raised its discrepancies with Draghi.

Giuseppe Conte met Draghi, he handed him a nine-point document and warned him that he awaits an answer in the rest of July.

Matteo Salvini, who has become the most popular politician in Italy – four years ago he reached 34.5% of consensus in the polls – today has half of it.

The Northern League, which has not suffered divisions, is shaken by the results of the polls and by the growing internal divisions.

“We cannot continue like this”, warns Salvini. He is preparing his attack themes but is more cautious than his Five Star rivals, because the early elections do not suit him if discrepancies erupt and Draghi, as he has warned, resigns and retires.

The danger is that the elections in the autumn will give a triumphant verdict to Giorgia Melloni’s Brothers of Italy. The two parties are linked in a coalition together with Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, which sails with a measly 7.5% in the polls. The three together collect 45% of the votes according to the polls. The center-left travels much lighter.

Salvini also cannot let his opponents win the initiative. He has already started beating the patch in favor radical reforms that lower taxes and against the law promoted by the center-left Democratic Party, which capitalizes 21.6% in the polls, in favor of a law on citizenship for the millions of children and adolescents born in the country, children of immigrants, without citizenship.

Their only reality is Italy and they go to school. The project is to anticipate the granting of citizenship. They currently don’t get it until the age of 18.

political and social storm

Draghi knows that the winds of confrontation will come from the side of the two major populist parties that will turn into a hurricane because the internal dynamics and the crises that are multiplying in the various areas of Italian life have shortened the time.

Social issues dominate the landscape and it is believed that the government will have no choice but to accept an increase in the public deficit, which currently exceeds 152%, also accumulated due to the fight against the virus in 2020-21.

In the last weeks the demand for a minimum wage is growing, for the consolidation of aid schemes for the most needyas in the discussed Revenue of citizenship which ensures a subsidy to the most needy.

The multimillion-dollar need for help from companies called upon to ease the reins on low wage increases in Italy must also be addressed.

climate crisis

In addition to the pandemic and the war in Ukraine, climate problems, already a world priority, have become pressing in Italy. The unprecedented warmth this summer the fires have multiplied by the thousands. A week ago a gigantic glacier collapsed due to the warm temperature in Marmolada, the “queen of the Dolomites”, the mountain range of the Alps in north-eastern Italy.

A gigantic and impressive hole was left when much of the glacier’s contents went down the slopes of a mountain and killed at least ten tourists who were walking to the top. There are others missing. The country was stunned by the extent of the natural disaster.

Meanwhile, the recovery plan of 200 billion dollars of loans and subsidies from the European Union to Italy continues, but the risks that political conflicts lead to the fall of the Draghi government and early national elections are growing, partly interrupting an effort that seemed to be kissed. from the fortune of the European decision to allocate a mountain of money to the industrial revitalization and to the Italian public structure.

The political crisis, if it continues to worsen, will end liquidate the optimism who lived in Italy in May, when the third summer was coming since the beginning of the Covid pandemic which has already cost almost 170 thousand dead in the country.

The war in Ukraine and the uncertain showdown with Russia have already dampened much enthusiasm. Political, economic and social conflicts complete a panorama of gloomy prospects for an Italy which, without Mario Draghi, would be orphaned by the only highly regarded international statesman.

The greatest danger is that political strife, social strife and economic decline take center stage.

Rome, correspondent

CB