Salvini believes that the cabinet is too accommodating to the left-wing parties that are also part of the government. Since the beginning of this year, 22,000 migrants from North Africa have arrived in Italy, which Salvini wants to put a stop to. He also wants taxes to be lowered, for example on excise duties, to improve the purchasing power of pensioners and to reform the judiciary. He also wants to improve public order, especially in the big cities.
Cabinet
Former European Central Bank president Mario Draghi has headed a multi-party cabinet since February last year, including the populist Five Star Movement, the center-left PD and the Lega. His main task is to manage the billions of euros that Italy has received and borrowed and to reform the economy. There will be new parliamentary elections next year. But the question now is whether Salvini is more likely to cause a cabinet crisis.
The only opposition party is Giorgia Meloni’s right-wing Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy) party. That position is paying off. During the recent local elections, the party rose again. Even in Northern Italy, the traditional stronghold of the Lega, Fratelli d’Italia often turns out to be the largest party. For over a year now, there has been a shift of the right-wing electorate from the Lega to the Fratelli d’Italia.
Answer
Salvini tries in all sorts of ways to find an answer to this. But many of his actions fail. This applies, for example, to his recent and later withdrawn intention to go to Moscow, where he was eager to talk about peace with Russian President Putin. This led to much criticism and misunderstanding, also because it was not exactly an initiative on behalf of the government. While Meloni is in opposition, like Draghi, he is on the side of NATO against Russia.