Last week, Giuseppe Conte, the Italian prime minister, managed to survive a confidence vote in the country’s Senate, but he will have to work with a brittle government going forward. Failing to win an absolute majority, he won the vote by a 156-140 margin.
Conte appealed to the ministers and told them that a government collapse in the middle of a health emergency could be catastrophic for the country once again on lockdown and with its GDP down about 10 percent.
Italy, under Conte’s rule, was the first nation outside of China to lock down last year. Italians have seen some of the toughest lockdown rules in the E.U., with citizens barred from traveling outside the region in which they live.
Now, however, there is pushback. Compliance in Italy is at an all-time low, and restaurants and bars continue to open despite the risk of hefty fines.
“We expected the government to be able to avoid further lockdowns,” Umberto Carriera, a restaurant owner in the Italian town of Pesaro, told the Wall Street Journal. “But there was no real plan, and we haven’t received enough financial help. And it’s clear to us that the vaccine won’t cover the bulk of the population before September.”
Today, under mounting pressure, Prime Minister Conte resigned after one of his governing partners pulled out of the coalition. He will try, however, to form a new government. If he fails, Italy’s president, Sergio Mattarella, could ask another candidate from a new administration. If that fails, fresh elections would be called.
TREND FORECAST: There will be strong populist movements springing up throughout Europe and nations across the globe against established political parties that will be targeted for imposing strict lockdown rules, which have destroyed millions of businesses and hundreds of millions of lives.
