Italy's choice

The upcoming national referendum in Italy is of existential importance for Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, a consistent supporter of the EU. Renzi publicly linked his political future to the results of this referendum, closely observed by the entire European continent. Its main goal - liquidation of Senate, which will allow the government to implement a number of measures to improve the efficiency of Italian economy, which is currently in a deep crisis. Two right-wing politics are against these constitutional amendments - a comedian-turned-politician and leader of Five Star Movement Beppe Grillo, as well as leader of nationalist (and, according to many observers, separatist) movement Lega Nord Matteo Salvini.

Grillo's and Salvini's supporters accuse Renzi of being influenced by Brussels and Berlin.Prime Minister's books are no longer bestsellers in Italy, today's Italians are buying books like "Il Quarto Reich" ("The Fourth Reich"), written by well-known Italian journalists Vittorio Feltri and Gennaro Sangiuliano. It is about Germany and its economic hegemony on the European continent, which leads to impoverishment of peoples of southern Europe. There are a lot of people who read such literature in Italy, since the level of unemployment there is quite high - according to opinion polls, 3/4 of country's population believe that only Germany benefits from the existence of eurozone. 

Matteo Renzi tries to distance himself from the image of "Brussels' puppet" by criticizing the European Union. However Italians don't believe in euroscepticism of their Prime Minister, seeing it as an attempt to get the support of citizens. At the same time, Renzi tries to boost Italy's role in decision-making in Brussels without much success. That is why he invited Angela Merkel and Francois Hollande to the Mediterranean island Ventotene this summer. As Die Welt reports citing German diplomatic circles, Renzi "has a false illusion that he can turn German-French locomotive into a trio with the participation of Italy." "But perhaps it is Brussels who doesn't understand the situation - because the EU needs Italy," publication writes, criticizing lack of European solidarity with Italy. In particular, the EU basically left Italy face-to-face with the migration crisis. "We are doing everything so that Renzi would win the referendum. We show a good example in the migration policy, we are resettling 500 migrants on a monthly basis," German diplomats say. It should be understood that 500 is a ridiculous figure considering the scale of migration crisis. Only in October of this year 157,000 migrants arrived in Italy. "It's not hard for populists to present the EU in a bad light, because the EU is behaving badly," conservative German publication admits.

No one should seriously expect that Germany, France and other major European countries will help Italians in fair resettlement of refugees from Africa and the Middle East. Next year there will be presidential elections in France and parliamentary elections in Germany, so they won't take additional refugees, because it will be a political suicide for the governments of these countries. Not to mention that Germany is already in a very difficult position because of the looming threat of cancellation of migrants deal by Turkey. Italy was left alone with its own problems. If country's population will vote against the adoption of constitutional amendments, the chance of success of anti-European forces at the elections that will be held after Matteo Renzi's inevitable resignation will be extremely high.