“We must close immediately by Sunday.” Giuseppe Conte is in a hurry. We cannot fail, nor allow ourselves to be postponed until September, he explains to other leaders, “Europe would not hold up”. Imagine if it can hold Italy, which without that money risks bankruptcy and a political crisis. “We need – he says – answers for our citizens.” We need an agreement, any agreement, even a compromise on the downside. We need a piece of paper where it is written that Rome can quickly access the Recovery Fund, otherwise there will be trouble for the premier. Plan B will start, it will be necessary to access the MES funds, the Five Stars will explode, the government will fall and, who knows, Mario Draghi will also be back on track. We have already gone into debt for a hundred billion, somehow we will have to get back.
Conte’s path is narrow. It needs a pact with the EU to launch extraordinary funds to face the post-Covid crisis, but the blockade of the “frugal”, led by Holland and Austria, is a wall: to obtain subsidies, they argue, “forward-looking reforms” are needed, not the nationalizations decided in recent weeks by Palazzo Chigi. And the states must decide, not the commissions. Even the most helpful allies, like Angela Merkel, appear perplexed. The money from the Recovery Fund will be disbursed against precise and detailed national investment plans, not the Villa Pamphilj parades. And the expensive solutions devised for Autostrade, Alitalia and Ilva are not exactly going in the right direction. Weren’t you, they ask, with water in your throat? Are you not avoiding bankruptcy only thanks to the ECB? And the chronic political instability, combined with the prime minister’s lack of decision-making power and his current weakness, does not help in the negotiation.
So the summit starts uphill. Conte tries to escape from the trap rich countries against poor countries. «It is not just a question of financial flows, we are developing an economic and social response for all European citizens, to be more competitive. The crisis is tough and we need adequate measures that can be practiced in practice ». It will be a long and difficult weekend, the premier is aware of this. “We have to overcome the differences.” Roberto Gualtieri seems optimistic: «I don’t think the solution will be the extreme one, with the intergovernmental blockade desired by some. I am convinced that in the end there will be a balanced outcome and the Commission will have the task of autonomously managing disbursements ».
He also knows Conte that, in the event of bankruptcy, he will spend bad weeks. The sponsors of the governissimo, rejoiced by the meeting between Mario Draghi and Luigi Di Maio, would start charging. The stomach pains of the Democratic Party, forced to sacrifice its reformist vocation in the name of the alliance with the grillini, would become irrepressible. Renzi would raise his head. A new majority, with a new prime minister, would return to current affairs. In fact, good signals do not come from Rome. If Francesco Boccia is “convinced that the government does not take risks”, Gualtieri actually opens to Mes: “We have never ruled out the use of this credit line”. Roberto Speranza agrees: “An extraordinary opportunity, I’m already working on it”. Too bad that, just hearing about the Stability Mechanism, seasickness occurs at 5s. However, without a convincing Recovery, Conte will have to throw himself on the Save States, as Merkel suggested to him, with the risk of finding himself with a different majority thanks to the yes of Fi. “Italy must ask for those funds,” insists Antonio Tajani. Will the Five Star Movement still look good? Will the Giallorossi alliances rule for the regional teams? Ah yes, in September we vote.
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