Rome: Italy’s 5-Star Movement said Thursday that 15 of its senators will be expelled from the party after they voted “no” in a confidence vote for Premier Mario Draghi’s newly formed government.
The expulsions illustrated how Draghi’s appointment has badly split the 5-Star Movement, which was created as a grass-roots, anti-establishment protest force opposed to the pro-European banking establishment that the new premier represents to many members. Draghi, 73, is a former president of the European Central Bank and served as the Bank of Italy’s governor.
The movement, the biggest vote-getter in Italy’s 2018 general election, nevertheless decided to back Draghi out of a sense of national responsibility, given the crisis posed by the coronavirus pandemic and resulting economic devastation.
More 5-Star lawmakers faced a similar fate after the lower Chamber of Deputies followed the Senate and voted overwhelmingly late Thursday to back Draghi’s Cabinet, voting 535-56 with five abstentions.
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According to 5-Star Movement regulations, lawmakers can be expelled if they vote contrary to the positions of the party’s registered members, who are given a say on individual proposals via an online platform that is the hallmark of the 5-Stars’ brand of “direct democracy.”