Italy president tasks House speaker to break stall over new gov't

ROME, April 23 (Xinhua) -- Italian President Sergio Mattarella on Monday tasked Lower House Speaker Roberto Fico of the populist Five Star Movement with a so-called "exploratory mandate" to try to form a government with the center-left Democratic Party of outgoing Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni.

Italy has been in a political stall since an inconclusive March 4 election.

Mattarella, whose job is to name Italy's next prime minister, gave Fico until Thursday to "verify the possibility of an agreement on a parliamentary majority" between the Five Stars and the Democrats, presidential secretary-general Ugo Zampetti announced in televised comments.

"I will get to work right away," Fico said after his meeting with Mattarella. "I believe we must begin with the issues and the program in the interests of the country."

Fico has been a prominent member of the Five Star Movement since its inception in 2009. He is said to have leftist sympathies and has an "excellent relationship" with Democratic MPs, according to influential Corriere della Sera newspaper.

Born in Naples in 1974, he has a degree in communications and was elected to a second term in the Lower House earlier this month.

The March 4 election delivered two relative winners: a center-right bloc led by the rightwing, anti- immigrant League, which also includes ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi's moderate Forza Italia party with 37 percent of the vote; and the anti-establishment Five Star Movement with 32.5 percent.

Voters also delivered a crushing defeat to the Democrats, who got 17 percent of the vote.

Neither the center-right bloc nor the Five Stars won enough seats in parliament to form a government on their own, and both their leaders -- Matteo Salvini of the League and Luigi Di Maio of the Five Stars -- have claimed the right to lead the next government of Italy.

On April 18, Mattarella tasked the two relative winners with trying to set up a government. However, those talks have proven fruitless as the two sides bickered over mutually incompatible demands.

Italy's two houses of parliament -- the 315-member senate and the 630-seat lower house -- have equal powers, and both must vote their confidence in any new government.

General elections in Italy are supposed to be held every five years. However, the country has a history of shaky coalition governments that fall apart long before the end of their mandate. Enditem