Italy

The Naples prosecutor’s office has opened a corruption investigation into the UniPegaso-Multiversity group, alleging its president, Fabio Domenico Vaccarono, attempted to exert pressure on the Minister of University and Research, Anna Maria Bernini. The probe reaches into the upper tiers of the national media, naming the CEO of the company that publishes Il Fatto Quotidiano. While the publisher promised cooperation and the newspaper’s editor defended the role of the judiciary, the focus remains on the specific influence of lobbyists on academic policy.

The government has secured a double vote of confidence to push through its new electoral law, with a third and final vote expected today. The move bypasses internal friction within the coalition, where the smaller partners, Lega and Forza Italia, have found their preferred amendments sidelined by Fratelli d’Italia. It is a familiar parliamentary maneuver: when a coalition cannot agree on the details of the rules, the Prime Minister simply mandates that they agree on the result.

A new report on the national housing crisis found that 3.2 million homes sit vacant while 300,000 families remain on waiting lists for social housing. Elsewhere, the country’s bid to host the 2032 European Championship is facing logistical scrutiny; while Rome plans to modernize its Olympic Stadium, several other proposed venues exist only as architectural renderings. Building stadiums that do not exist is historically more difficult than filling houses that already do.