Italy’s Renzi told to stay put a bit longer

Calls mounted rapidly Monday from populist and other opposition leaders for quick elections in Italy, seeking to capitalize on Premier Matteo Renzi’s humiliating defeat in a referendum on governmentchampioned reforms.

The president, though, told Renzi to stay in office a bit longer until a critical budget law is passed.

“With the referendum vote, the Italians have expressed a clear political signal — the desire to go as soon as possible to elections,” wrote Vito Crimi and Danilo Toninelli, two of the top leaders of the populist, anti-euro, 5-Star Movement in a piece accompanying the blog of Movement founder, comic Beppe Grillo.

Barely an hour after the referendum was resoundingly rejected Sunday by voters, Renzi announced he would keep his promise to quit if the measures fail to win popular muster.

With the defeat plunging Europe’s fourth-largest economy into political and economic uncertainty, and financial markets seeking reassurances, President Sergio Mattarella asked Renzi to hold off on leaving until the budget legislation is passed.

Renzi called on Mattarella at the Quirinal Palace Monday evening and told the head of state it was not possible to continue in his post, after putting the fate of his nearly three-year-old centre-left government on the line in the referendum vote and losing, a palace statement said.

But, in a decision widely expected, Mattarella told Renzi “to delay his resignation until that task (of the budget law) is completed.”

Mattarella can ask someone else to try to form a government and work with the same Parliament, at least for a few months.