Italy's PM-designate to unveil technocrat cabinet line-up: reports

ROME - Italian Prime Minister-designate Carlo Cottarelli is expected to select and unveil the line-up of his technocrat cabinet on Tuesday, according to local media.

Cottarelli, a former official of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), was conferred the mandate by President Sergio Mattarella on Monday, some 24 hours after a bid by two populist parties to form a government failed.

His cabinet would be made by up to 12 ministers, mostly professionals, Ansa news agency reported.

They would only temporarily serve for the country, but not run in the snap elections that were likely to be held in autumn, or in spring 2019 at latest.

Among the names suggested by media reports were those of director general of the Bank of Italy Salvatore Rossi, and president of the Italian Institute of Social Security Tito Boeri for key economic ministries.

Secretary general of the Foreign Affairs Ministry and International Cooperation Elisabetta Belloni and Italian ambassador to Moscow Pasquale Terracciano were among the possible candidates as foreign minister, Ansa reported.

The president of Italy's anti-corruption agency Raffaele Cantone might serve in the Ministry of Infrastructures, while former Constitutional Court judge Sabino Cassese and rector of Rome's LUISS university Paola Severino were two likely names for the Ministry of Justice, according to La Repubblica newspaper.

None of the ministers in the technocrat cabinet, nor the PM-designate, would run in the next campaign, Cottarelli specified in a short message from the presidential palace on Monday, after accepting the mandate.

The PM-designate's plan was to present a government program that would include the approval of the 2019 budget law, one of the country's urgent commitments this year. After achieving this task, Cottarelli said he would lead the country to snap elections in early 2019.

Yet, the chances for his technocrat cabinet to win confidence votes in both houses of the parliament -- as required by constitution -- were very low.

So far, only the center-left Democratic Party (PD) has confirmed its support to Cottarelli, while all of the other major parties -- and especially M5S and League, which together hold the majority of seats -- said they would vote against.

If this was the case, Cottarelli explained his cabinet would "immediately resign" and stay in charge for current affairs only, bringing the country towards elections "after August."

The current crisis was triggered by president Mattarella's refusal to confirm a euro-skeptic economist as finance minister, as proposed by anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) and far-right League.

The economist, 81-year-old Paolo Savona, has in the past described the euro as a "European straitjacket" and suggested Italy should leave the single currency if "the future of the country was in jeopardy."

Refusing to bend to the president's suggestions to choose another candidate from their own lists, M5S and League dropped their bid to form a government.

In a later message to the country, President Mattarella explained he had accepted all of the M5S-League proposals for the cabinet, but could not give the green light to a finance minister who "would likely, or almost certainly, bring Italy's exit from the euro-zone."

This would have been contrary to the political campaign run by the two parties in the 2017 elections, which -- although critical towards some European Union (EU9 policies -- did not contemplate, not discuss such a radical perspective, Mattarella said.