Centre-left Democratic Party (PD)
caretaker leader Maurizio Martina on Tuesday morning sounded out
key PD players ahead of a meeting this afternoon with Lower
House Speaker Roberto Fico who has been given a mandate to
explore a possible government between the PD and Fico's
anti-establishment 5-Star Movement (M5S).
Martina has been hearing from regional chiefs, the main PD
mayors and regional governors, as well as leading figures in the
party, sources said.
A majority of the PD still loyal to ex-leader and ex-premier
Matteo Renzi is dead set against an alliance with the M5s and
wants to stay in opposition.
Minority leaders including Culture Minister Dario
Franceschini and Justice Minister Andrea Orlando are reportedly
more amenable to talks with the M5S.
Franceschini said in a newspaper interview Tuesday that the
PD should talk to the M5S about forming a new government
"without prejudice".
Fico on Monday received his exploratory mandate from
President Sergio Mattarella to sound out the possibility of a
government between the M5S and the PD, which have been
traditional opponents.
The majority of the PD, loyal to Renzi, are against all talk
of an alliance.
But Franceschini told La Repubblica that the PD has the
"obligation" to talk to the M5S "without prejudice", keeping the
party "united" starting with its "most influential" leader,
Renzi.
Renzi quit after the PD slumped to its worst-ever showing,
18%, in the March 4 general election - where the M5s became the
biggest single party with 32% and the centre right with 37% the
biggest coalition.
Franceschini told La Repubblica that the PD must "go and see
the (M5S) papers" and assess the feasibility of a
government-formation accord.
As for the possibility of accepting M5S leader Luigi Di Maio
as premier, Franceschini stressed to the Rome daily "let's take
it gradually".
He said "let's see the programmes and also how we might
achieve an agreement".
Now that the country has been "saved from a populist and
sovereignist government" after a possible M5S alliance with the
anti-migrant Euroskeptic League of Matteo Salvini was scotched,
Franceschini said, "the mandate for Fico puts a new question to
the PD".
He said "we are called to a trial of responsibility" and
urged the party to "put its proposals into the field, as
(caretaker leader Maurizio) Martina has done" with three
proposals on poverty, families and work.
Fico was called to negotiate after a bid by Senate Speaker
Maria Elisabetta Alberti Casellati, to sound out the possibility
of a centre-right-M5S government, failed.
It foundered on the M5S's opposition to the League's ally,
former premier Silvio Berlusconi.
Berlusconi's centre-right Forza Italia (FI) party got 14% in
the general election, being overtaken by Salvini's rightwing
populist League with 17.5%.
Salvini has threatened to "make a trip to Rome", seen by some
as an echo of Mussolini's March on Rome, if he is excluded from
government.
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