Italian PM Conte seeks to stay in power with Senate vote

ROME — Italian Premier Giuseppe Conte is facing a second round of voting Tuesday to determine if he can hold onto power after a junior coalition partner pulled his party’s ministers from the government to protest Conte’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic.

Conte on Monday won what amounted to a confidence vote in the lower Chamber of Deputies, securing a 321-to-259 victory in favour of his government with 27 abstentions, including from the defecting Italia Viva (Italy Alive) party of ex-Premier Matteo Renzi.

Conte went before the Senate on Tuesday to urge continued backing, but support in the upper chamber for his coalition government headed by the 5-Star Movement and Democratic Party is slimmer.

Even if Conte survives the vote, his already fragile coalition will be weakened. The opposition centre-right is demanding an early election, but that option is considered the least likely outcome of the political crisis, given the difficulty of organizing a campaign and vote during a pandemic.