Rome: Former European Central Bank (ECB) boss Mario Draghi formed Italy’s new government on Friday, unveiling a cabinet that included unaffiliated technocrats and politicians from across the spectrum.
President Sergio Mattarella had asked Draghi to be prime minister after the previous administration collapsed amid party wrangling. Mattarella tasked Draghi with tackling the covid-19 health crisis and the economic meltdown.
After a week of talks, major parties from across the political spectrum backed Draghi, who named key figures from various groups as ministers.
The 5-Star Movement’s Luigi Di Maio will stay on as foreign minister, while League party leader Giancarlo Giorgetti will be industry minister. Andrea Orlando, of the centre-left Democratic Party, will be labour minister.
Some key posts were distributed among non-affiliated technocrats including Daniele Franco, director general of Bank of Italy, who was named economy minister and Roberto Cingolani, a physicist and IT expert, who will be minister for green transition.
There are eight women in the 23-strong cabinet.
The new team will be sworn in on Saturday, opening the way for debates in both houses of parliament early next week, where Draghi will unveil his policy plans and face a confidence vote—a formality given his cross-party backing.
Draghi got a boost on Thursday when the 5-Star Movement, the largest group in parliament, agreed to back the government. No single party will have the numbers to bring it down.
Recovery fund
A key reason why so many parties have joined forces is because each wants a say in how Italy spends the more than €200 billion ($242.56 billion) it is set to get from a European Union economic recovery fund.
Draghi, 73, is widely credited with having saved the euro currency during his time as ECB boss and will be influential in shaping EU debate on how the bloc should engineer its economic revival.
Draghi has said he will make the anti-coronavirus vaccine programme a priority. Italy has registered some 93,000 deaths linked to covid-19 since its outbreak last February, the second-highest toll in Europe.
Photo courtesy: World Economic Forum/Wikimedia Commons