Mario Draghi submitted his resignation to Italian President Sergio Mattarella on Thursday morning.
Rome:
Mario Draghi, who, as head of the European Central Bank, helped save the eurozone, presided over a remarkable period of unity as Italy’s prime minister, before clashing with his notoriously unstable political system.
The star economist was never directly elected, but gained the support of almost all political parties when he took office in February 2021, positioning Italy on the international stage as a respected leader in the European Union and the G7.
He was tasked with fighting the coronavirus pandemic and the aftermath of a recession in Europe’s third-largest economy, just as Italy was awarded a large chunk of an unprecedented multi-billion-euro EU recovery package to boost growth. stimulate.
Enjoying rising personal popularity and the confidence of Brussels and the financial markets, Draghi was seen as the best choice for reinvigorating a stagnating economy plagued by structural inefficiencies and a punitive bureaucracy through structural reforms. long delayed by infighting and inertia.
But with elections next year, parties in his coalition became increasingly restless and Draghi’s stern warnings to stop political games were not heeded.
Three parties in his coalition refused to participate in a confidence vote on Wednesday, pulling the plug on the government.
Draghi submitted his resignation to Italian President Sergio Mattarella on Thursday morning.
Basketball and banking
Born on September 3, 1947 in Rome to an affluent family, Draghi lost both parents in his mid-teens, leaving him to care for two younger siblings.
As a young man, he was never a rebel, even though he sympathized with the protest movement of 1968. “My hair was quite long, but not very long,” he told the German magazine Die Zeit in 2015.
Draghi was educated in an elite Jesuit-run high school where he excelled in math, Latin and basketball, sharing lessons with the likes of former Ferrari boss Luca Cordero di Montezemolo.
Draghi, who is married with two children, remains a practicing Catholic.
In 1970, Draghi graduated in economics, with a thesis stating that the single currency was “a folly, something that absolutely should not be done” – a view that later evolved, as he became one of the biggest proponents of the euro.
He holds a PhD from the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the United States and has taught economics at several Italian universities.
After spending six years at the World Bank from 1984 to 1990, he headed the Treasury Department of the Italian Ministry of Economy for ten years and worked under nine separate governments.
From that position, Draghi masterminded large-scale privatizations and contributed to deficit reduction efforts that qualified Italy for the euro.
No ‘lame compromises’
In 2002, Draghi joined Goldman Sachs management, before being tapped three years later to head the Bank of Italy following a scandal involving its former head, Antonio Fazio.
He was appointed head of the European Central Bank (ECB) in November 2011, when a near-bankruptcy in Italy threatened to cause the entire eurozone to collapse.
A year later, Draghi changed history by promising to “do everything to preserve the euro”, adding: “And believe me, it will be enough.”
He was credited with helping save the single currency. That rescue, however, came only with the help of hefty cash injections and historically low interest rates — which has brought him the ire of conservatives, especially in Germany.
People who saw “Super Mario” at work at the ECB say he was a skilled negotiator with sharp political antennae, and ready to play “bad cop” to influence decisions in his favor, a former employee told AFP.
Draghi is someone who doesn’t accept “lame compromises” in order to maintain the consensus, the assistant said.
After leaving the ECB in 2019, Draghi kept a low profile and spent most of Italy’s coronavirus crisis at his mansion in central Umbria.
He was called upon by President Sergio Mattarella to lead Italy after Giuseppe Conte’s previous government collapsed in January 2021.
He was tipped to replace Mattarella in the presidential election to parliament earlier this year, but Mattarella was eventually recalled for a second term after lawmakers disagreed on someone else.
(This story was not edited by DailyExpertNews staff and was generated automatically from a syndicated feed.)
