After a seesaw week that spooked financial markets, Italy’s populist forces reunited on Thursday and reached a deal to form a government that would put Europe’s fourth largest economy into the hands of parties deeply antagonistic to the European Union, its currency and illegal migrants.
Only days ago, President Sergio Mattarella of Italy rejected their previous cabinet over concerns about a key minister who had suggested he wants to withdraw Italy from the group of countries that use the euro, Europe’s single currency. The chaotic consequences of such a move — however remote — alarmed many investors and resurrected fears about a possible fracturing of the European Union.
On Thursday evening, the party leaders presented the president with a reshuffled cabinet that would make it difficult for Mr. Mattarella to reject them a second time.
But the newly constituted government, of the anti-establishment Five Star Movement and the anti-immigrant League, still left open the question of whether reaction of financial markets to Italy’s political chaos this week had chastened them, or whether it simply had led them to disguise their hostility as the price of admission into power.
“An agreement for a political government between the Five Star Movement and the League has been reached,” said a joint statement issued Thursday night by the League leader, Matteo Salvini, and Five Star leader, Luigi Di Maio. The statement also said that their original choice for prime minister, Giuseppe Conte, would remain their pick.
Source : Nytimes
