No Leader, No Purpose? The Crisis Of Italy's Five Star

Italy's Five Star Movement (M5S) once threatened to upend the political order, but today the party founded by a stand-up comedian has little to laugh about as it risks imploding

Rome, (APP - UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 21st May, 2021 ) :Italy's Five Star Movement (M5S) once threatened to upend the political order, but today the party founded by a stand-up comedian has little to laugh about as it risks imploding.

Just three years ago, the then proudly anti-establishment M5S won a stunning 33 percent of the vote in a landmark general election win that propelled it into power.

But it currently has no formal leader, is hopelessly divided and is languishing in the polls after several policy U-turns and broken campaign promises.

"They are really on the rocks," commented Piergiorgio Corbetta, an emeritus professor at the University of Bologna who has written extensively about the rise and fall of the M5S.

The movement remains part of Prime Minister Mario Draghi's national unity government and the largest party in parliament.

But between a quarter and a third of its lawmakers have left or have been expelled from its ranks, while it is half as popular as it was in 2018, polling at under 17 percent.

Former premier Giuseppe Conte has been tapped to take over and revive the party, but his nomination has been blocked by in-fighting.

They are now, according to Corbetta, "totally irrelevant" in Draghi's government, holding just four out of 23 ministerial posts, and politically drifting, with their putative alliance with the centre-left Democratic Party (PD) a work in progress.

"I can't deny that it is a difficult and tense period," M5S lawmaker Sergio Battelli told AFP. "The movement has evolved, it has changed, it has made some errors... but the M5S is here to stay."