Opinion

Italy, the centre-right coalition arrives at the formation of a government with the highest level of confrontation in a decade

photo_camera italia-mattarella

On 20 October, the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, begins consultations for the formation of a government, once the general elections have been held and once the new chambers have been constituted (as is well known, Ignazio La Russa, of the Brothers of Italy, is the new president of the Senate, while Lorenzo Fontana, of the League, will preside over the lower house). And the reality is that, barring an "intessa" (pact) at the beginning of the week, Mattarella will find it more difficult than expected to form a government, since two of the coalition members, Meloni's Brothers of Italy and Berlusconi's Forza Italia, are openly at loggerheads.

This festering was clearly visible on the 13th, when a vote was to be taken on the new Senate president. Meloni was clear that he wanted this post for La Russa, a veteran Sicilian politician who has been in Parliament since the 1992-94 legislature and who in the last legislature (the 18th, which took place between March 2018 and October 2022) was already vice-president of this same Chamber. Matteo Salvini did not object to the appointment of La Russa because Meloni offered him the Presidency of the Lower House in exchange for one of his own (the aforementioned Fontana), but he was met with a resounding "no" in the person of his other coalition partner, former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Berlusconi, with a court case still pending (the alleged bribery of participants in the famous "Villa Arcore" parties in 2010), did not want the presidency of either of the two chambers, but rather, in exchange for his votes (which gave the "maggioranza" in the Senate to 111 votes out of 200), that Meloni would accept the young parliamentarian Licia Ronzulli as the new Minister of Justice, a person easily "manageable" for "Il Cavaliere" and who would be under his direct orders. 

But it was then that he was met with a resounding "no" from the leader of the Brothers of Italy, probably for two fundamental reasons. Firstly, because she did not intend to enter into a "tragalas" with a party that has by far the least weight in the new "maggioranza". Secondly, because it was precisely for Justice that she already had a name, that of the person with the most weight on the lists with which she contested the elections: the magistrate from the conservative Nordio current, a very prestigious figure whom she had already tried to make, last January, President of the Republic, something she finally failed to achieve because only her party voted in favour of Nordio's candidacy. And that was probably what Silvio Berlusconi was most worried about with regard to the Ministry of Justice: that with Nordio there were no "compromises" or possible protection from his feared "togge rosse". Berlusconi's claim that the judiciary is trying to send him to prison because, as the vast majority of the magistrates are communists (according to the former premier's version), they are after him, among other reasons because he has built his political career partly on constantly denigrating the communists, as his close friend Bettino Craxi did at the time.

Faced with Meloni's "no", Berlusconi ordered his MPs not to vote for La Russa, leaving him with only 99 votes and no chance of an absolute majority with which to be elected. The problem for "Il Cavaliere" was that it was a secret ballot, a perfect opportunity for "snipers" (people who vote against their party's orders) or unexpected voters, because it was assumed that all the others (Terzo Polo, Democratic Party (PD) and Five Stars), being part of the opposition, would vote against La Russa and his candidacy would automatically fall.

Then the unexpected happened: as many as 17 senators from outside the centre-right (or, who knows, maybe they did, because who can be sure that some were not from Forza Italia?) voted in favour of La Russa, so that with 116 votes out of 200 he automatically became the new Senate president.

Berlusconi's reaction could not have been more furious: when La Russa approached him to try to reassure him (after all, they are old acquaintances), he insulted her unceremoniously. In addition, he wrote in a note derogatory remarks about Meloni, such as "know-it-all", "presumptuous" and "arrogant", which were caught on camera. Finally, he accused Renzi and the Terzo Polo of having voted in favour of La Russa. But Renzi and his party immediately denied this, claiming that they had abstained.

Certainly, "Il Cavaliere" is not wrong when he thinks that Renzi and his supporters could have agreed with Meloni to vote in favour of La Russa, since, given the bad relations of Il Terzo Polo with the Democratic Party (PD) and Five Stars, they feared that in the distribution of the vice-presidencies and the presidencies of the committees into which the Senate is subdivided, they would be excluded from everything with the joint votes of the rest of the opposition. But it is equally true that, however much Il Terzo Polo voted for La Russa despite claims to the contrary, there are still eight more votes (to the 116 obtained by the Sicilian senator) that it is not known where they came from.

As expected, Fontana's election to the lower house was much calmer: the entire centre-right voted for him because he was Salvini's candidate, not Meloni's. And some people are very fond of him. And yet some people have vetoed him because they consider him to be an ultra-conservative Catholic who cannot even see the LGTBI collective (i.e. lesbians, male homosexuals and others).

The weekend has been quiet, but the last few weeks have shown that both Berlusconi and Salvini are not exactly happy that the "head of the coalition" is the one who for years was the "ugly duckling" of the centre-right: the Roman Meloni. For Salvini, Meloni is nothing more than the leader of a minority party that has "snatched" the presidency of the Council of Ministers from him at the last moment after having been the main dominator of political life during the 18th Legislature. In turn, Berlusconi finds it even worse to be the weakest of the winning coalition in these elections, when for many years he was the first party by far and, between 2018 and 2022, he came in second place with very little difference with respect to Salvini (17% to 14%) against a Meloni who seemed no more than a mere complement (4.4% voted for him in the March 2018 elections).

Surely the three parties will settle their differences when the time comes to form a government. But there are certainly no shortage of controversies to be resolved. The first is whether Salvini will be able to return to head the Interior, as he wants, or whether he will have to settle for another ministry. The second is who will be in charge of Justice, although for the moment Meloni has not budged from the intention that Nordio will be in charge of this portfolio. And there is a third issue that is not the result of conflicts between these three parties, but rather the absence of candidates

In fact, the big problem facing Meloni is that there is currently no prestigious economist willing to take over the all-important Ministry of Economy and Finance. Panetta, former director general of the Bank of Italy, has already said "no" several times, as has Daniele Franco, who held this portfolio under Draghi. In the case of Panetta, it is much more appealing to be part of the Governing Council of the European Central Bank (ECB, which is where he is now) than to head a ministry where he will have many difficulties in relation to the EU authorities with Meloni at the head of the Eurosceptics. Let us remember that the so-called prime minister of the third largest economy in the eurozone is the president of the European Parliamentary Group "Reformists and Conservatives", a grouping that once included the British Conservatives (now out of the EU because of Brexit) and which is below the family of the European People's Party, the Party of European Socialists, the Liberal Party and even the "Greens". Meanwhile, Daniele Franco is very close to Mario Draghi, the outgoing prime minister, who will surely look for a good fit for the man who has been his best collaborator while he presided over the Council of Ministers.

In reality, both Panetta and Franco, as well as others, do not want to be ministers under Meloni, but rather to succeed Ignazio Visco as governor of the Bank of Italy, since the latter's term of office is coming to an end. Franco has the best chance because he is now free and because Panetta is better off staying at the ECB, but it remains to be seen what will happen.

What is certain is that Meloni finds himself without a candidate for a very important portfolio at a time when the country is receiving a lot of European funds. Meloni is left with the card to play of former minister Tremonti, who already held this portfolio at the time, but Tremonti was the head of economy and finance when the Italian government was intervened and the then rector of Bocconi University (Mario Monti, November 2011) was put in his place, so it does not seem that his name was well received in EU circles.

It is this reality that has led Meloni to think of Giorgetti, a 'strongman' in Salvini's League (he is strongly supported by Umberto Bossi and Roberto Maroni), as a possible holder of this important portfolio. Giorgetti's problem is that, despite his important political career (dating back to his entry into the national parliament in 1996), he has a very limited background in economics. And to manage so many European funds is no good for just anyone

So it is with this situation that Meloni and her two coalition partners will present themselves to the President of the Republic, who must not only give Meloni the "incarico" to form a government, but also give the "go-ahead" to each and every one of the ministers she presents to him in the list to be discussed in the Quirinal Palace. We shall see which executive comes out of all this "negotiation", but the reality is that the coalition that won the last elections will present itself to the head of state in very clearly improved conditions. And, once again, it will be necessary to resort to the extraordinary skill and talent of the Sicilian Mattarella, forger of up to three different "magioranzas" between May 2018 and February 2021 (the like of which has never been seen in republican history), to unravel this tremendous gibberish. Once again, seeing is believing.

Pablo Martín de Santa Olalla Saludes is professor at Nebrija University and author of Historia de la Italia republicana (1946-2021) (Madrid, Sílex Ediciones, 2021).