display
Rome (dpa) - Italy's Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte can breathe a sigh of relief: After the coalition broke up and two votes of confidence in parliament, the 56-year-old remains in office.
He now leads a minority government.
Conte had to worry about twelve hours in the smaller of the two parliamentary chambers in Rome.
Then it was clear that he had won with 156 votes, but had not achieved an absolute majority.
"Now the goal is to make this majority even more solid," tweeted the head of government afterwards.
Because of the many loud protests, chaotic scenes and, on top of that, the review of the last vote cast, the meeting dragged on late into the night.
On Monday, the remaining alliance of the populist five-star movement, the Social Democrats (PD) and the mini-party Liberi e Uguali (The Free and Equals) won an absolute majority in the larger Chamber of Deputies with 321 votes.
However, the non-party lawyer could run into problems again with upcoming decisions: As for the votes of confidence, he has to secure the necessary majority to pass laws, especially in the Senate.
display
The political crisis came at an extremely unfavorable time: In the corona crisis, more than 83,000 people have died with the virus, and more than 2.4 million infections have been recorded.
In addition, the economy suffered severe damage during the restrictions.
After the votes, Conte called for action: "Get to work immediately and overcome the health emergency and the economic crisis," he demanded.
To help the economy back on its feet, Italy can get around 210 billion euros from the EU reconstruction fund.
For this, Conte has to bring a plan through parliament and present it in Brussels.
However, this is precisely where his center-left alliance fell apart.
The small party Italia Viva around ex-Prime Minister Matteo Renzi did not agree with the distribution of the funds and demanded that the aid from the euro bailout fund be accepted.
The co-ruling five-star movement rejected this, however, out of fear of possible interference by the EU in Italian affairs.
Renzi withdrew two of his ministers from the cabinet and plunged the government into turmoil.
© dpa-infocom, dpa: 210120-99-93449 / 3