Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi said he would step down after a coalition ally withdrew support for the government.
Mr. Draghi, the widely respected former head of the European Central Bank, led a broad coalition.
He won a vote of confidence in parliament, but decided to resign after the 5-Star party boycotted a bill designed to help Italians with soaring energy costs.
“I will submit my resignation to the president of the republic this evening,” Draghi announced during a cabinet meeting, according to a statement released by his office.
“This pro-government coalition of national unity no longer exists.”
President Sergio Mattarella will now decide whether to accept or reject the resignation and may ask Mr Draghi to return to parliament and request a vote for the government.
If the deadlock cannot be resolved, the president can find a caretaker leader or dissolve parliament and call an election as early as September or October.
An election took place in early 2023.
The populist 5-Star Party was the biggest party in the last election in 2018, but its support has dwindled and they complain that their interests are being ignored.
Mr Draghi, 74 years old, is Italysixth prime minister in the past decade,.
Since coming to power last February, he has helped keep the country on track with reforms mandated as part of a €200 billion coronavirus recovery package from the EU.
Giovanni Orsina, director of the school of government at LUISS university in Rome, said Mr Draghi would likely be ordered to return to parliament to see if he could secure a viable new majority.
“We’ve had pandemics, we’ve had wars, we’ve had inflation, we’ve had an energy crisis,” she said.
“So it’s definitely not a good moment. And also because [President] Mattarella believes, rightly so, his mission is to preserve stability. “
