For a highly indebted country likeItaly, which must hope every day for the benevolence of the financial markets and Western partners to finance its public debt, refuse the protective shield of Month it is pure self-harm and amateurish childishness. Crossing our fingers in the hope that a financial or banking crisis doesn't happen upon us is the least we can do but, even if a new black swan doesn't arrive among us, with the surprising rejection of the ESM we have offered our chests to speculation who has a good hand in identifying Italy as the weak point of the international financial system.
Le banks Italian governments, however solid they are, have some more reason to worry and to convince themselves that the Meloni Government, in addition to the slip-up in July on the extra tax on bank profits, is to all intents and purposes an anti-market Government. When the Salvini-Meloni sovereignist combination is triggered, some trouble always arises: financial but also political and institutional.
There are many who think, and the Minister of Economy Giancarlo Giorgetti he announced it, that we will pay dearly for the foolish prank on the ESM. Not only because we are in the crosshairs of the markets but because we have proven to be unreliable in the eyes of our European partners, France and Germany in the lead, who will not give us discounts on all future community dossiers. This concern is strong in the Italian establishment and at the top of our institutions and two elements symbolize it more than others: the coldness of the Quirinal towards the prime minister Giorgia Meloni and the silence of Bank of Italy.
The coldness of the Quirinale arises from Meloni's disrespectful attitudes that the No to the ESM emphasizes
The institutional collaboration between the President Sergio Mattarella and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni was born under the best auspices and lasted for the entire first part of the experience of the right-centre government, but it got stuck last summer and when the Prime Minister began to collect missteps and disrespectful attitudes towards the Quirinale. Since his mid-August trip to Tirana and the controversial agreement to transfer migrants from Italy, the channels of communication between the Quirinale and Palazzo Chigi have cooled. President Mattarella only found out about theItaly-Albania agreement, just as after the fact he learned of the Government's intention not to honor the international treaty on the ESM. But the frost also fell after Meloni's repeated lies about the premiership and the consequent effects of the constitutional reform on the prerogatives and functions of the President of the Republic.
Meloni does not miss an opportunity to provide reassurance on the defense of the role of institutional guarantee of the Head of State, but she is the first to know that, in its current form, the proposal to premiership it undermines the powers of the President of the Republic, if only because the future prime minister is imagined to be elected by the people and the Head of State is not.
The disorderly attacks of the President of the Senate, Ignazio La Russa, on Mattarella did the rest. The Head of State is an extremely correct person and will not interfere in the political game but he will certainly not let the role of the Presidency of the Republic be obscured, at least until the government's confusing constitutional reform is actually approved. But in recent days it has been and is above all Italy's European isolation with the No to the ESM that has alarmed the Quirinale and now everyone is waiting, with even greater curiosity than usual, for the end of year television message of the President. Even with all the institutional grace that is typical of him, will Mattarella mention it on the evening of December 31st?
No to the ESM: the silence of the Bank of Italy is not synonymous with approval. Waiting for Panetta's pronouncement
The Bank of Italy is also concerned about the dangers of European and international isolation of Italy and about the weakening of the country's defenses against possible financial and banking crises. Everyone knows that the new Governor Fabio Panetta he is a friend of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, but he is also a fervent pro-European, as he has demonstrated on the ECB board, and they are waiting to test his independence from political power.
Institutional practice does not envisage the new Governor suddenly rising up against the Government's No to the ESM but everyone thinks that Panetta will be able to find the way, the opportunity and the right words to point out the dangers to which failure to adhere to the ESM exposes the 'Italy both on a financial and banking level. The right opportunity could be Panetta's debut at Forex of Genoa where he will have to speak on February 10th. But it is not certain that the new Governor will not find a way to express his opinion on the rejection of the ESM even beforehand. Certainly the temporary silence of Via Nazionale on Italy's about-face on the ESM is not a sign of assent.
