State super technicians, ambassadors, prefects and grand commis: Carlo Cottarelli, he wasted no time and is ready to present to the President of the Republic, Sergio Mattarella, the list of ministers of his government which will have to receive the vote of Parliament this week. The appointed Premier will go up to the Quirinale at 16.30.
All the ministers in pectore are politically neutral and have undertaken not to stand as candidates in the next general elections.
Il key ministry of Economy and Finance will almost certainly be retained on an interim basis by Cottarelli himself, who is a great expert in public accounts, in the fight against waste and in scrupulous control of the public debt. The hope of Cottarelli and Mattarella is that this choice can reassure the financial markets, still shaken by the risk of a sneak exit of Italy from the euro overshadowed by the Lega-M5s government with the candidacy of the Eurosceptic economist Paolo Savona, blocked in extremis from the Quirinale in defense of the savings of the Italians.
The former prefect of Milan and former Extraordinary Commissioner of Rome Capital should go internally, Francesco Paolo Tronca, while the general secretary of the Farnesina is in pole position for the leadership of foreign affairs, Elisabetta Belloni. The ambassador is a candidate for economic development Giampiero Massolo, today president of ISPI and Fincantieri. For Justice, the most likely candidate to become minister is Alessandro Pajno, today President of the Council of State, if he does not become undersecretary to the Prime Minister.
It should go to the Ministry of Labor and Welfare Enrico Giovannini, former minister and president of Istat. The former minister Enzo Moavero Milanese it should go to European Affairs.
The Cottarelli government will hardly be able to receive the trust of the Parliament because the League and the Five Star Movement are on the barricades, Forza Italia will not support it so as not to provide Salvini with pretexts to break the center-right alliance and the Democratic Party, which will also support it, has no numbers to guarantee the birth of the new executive.
But whoever votes against the Cottarelli government will assume political responsibility for having made the automatic 12,5 billion euro VAT sting inevitable, with a burden on Italian families of over 300 euros.
What is certain, beyond the outcome of the vote in the Chambers, is that the new Government will not make any adventurous choices, it will allow Italy to be present at the next European and international summits and will guarantee an orderly conduct of future elections, which should be held in September.
