EXCLUSIVE: Why Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte resigned | READ DETAILS
chuks oti
Jan 26, 2021
Italian Prime Minister, Giuseppe Conte, went to see the head of state on Tuesday to hand in his resignation.
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This is as he hopes to be given the opportunity to try to put together a new coalition and rebuild his parliamentary majority.
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Conte lost his absolute majority in the upper house Senate last week when a junior partner, the Italia Viva party, headed by former premier Matteo Renzi, quit in a row over the government's handling of the coronavirus crisis and economic recession.
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Efforts to lure centrist and independent senators into the coalition ranks to fill the hole left by Renzi have met little success.
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This left Conte with no choice but to resign and open a formal government crisis that will give him more time to find a deal.
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President Sergio Mattarella is expected to accept his resignation and hold rapid consultations with party leaders to test the political waters.
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If he thinks Conte might get the necessary backing to pull together a new administration, he will give him a few days to try to finalise a deal and draw up a new cabinet.
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However, if he fails, Mattarella will have to come up with an alternative candidate deemed capable of piecing together a workable coalition.
If all else fails, he will have to call elections, two years ahead of schedule.
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Conte is a lawyer with no direct political affiliation but is close to the largest party in parliament, the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement.
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He first came to power in 2018 after 5-Star formed an unexpected coalition with the far-right League.
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When that pact unravelled a year later, he stayed on as head of a new administration involving the 5-Star and leftist parties.
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The deepening crisis is playing out against the backdrop of the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 85,000 Italians.
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Italy has the second-highest death toll in Europe after Britain and the sixth highest in the world.
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The health crisis has triggered the worst recession in Italy since World War II and the government has been struggling to draw up a plan on how best to spend some 200 billion euros ($240 billion) of European Union funds to help the economy recover.
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— chuks oti