Few people had heard of Giuseppe
Conte, the lawyer and academic tipped to become Italy's next
premier, until 5-Star Movement (M5S) leader Luigi Di Maio
presented him as the civil service minister of an eventual
government led by the anti-establishment group during the
election campaign.
But Conte had been working for the M5S behind the scenes for
some time and his relationship with Di Maio had become so close
that he was tasked with writing the justice section of the
movement's manifesto and the leader hired him as his lawyer.
Born in Volturara Appulla, a small town near the southern
city of Foggia, the 54-year-old is separated from his wife and
has a 10-year-old daughter.
Conte lives in Rome, where he has a big law firm, and he is a
professor of private law at Florence University.
He graduated in law at Rome University and did masters and
other post-graduate courses at Yale, Vienna, the Sorbonne and
New York University.
A high flier, he was named a member of a commission set up by
the premier's office in 1988, the year of his graduation, to
work on reform of the civil code.
He has had countless collaborations with foreign universities
and articles published in legal periodicals and he has written
several books.
He was also a member of the council for administrative law, a
post he quit when Di Maio announced he wanted him to be a
minister.
He said that he was a leftwinger before being won over by the
M5S.
"I voted for the left in the past," he said when he was
presented as part of an eventual M5S government team.
"Today I think the 20th-century ideological outlooks are no
longer adequate.
"I think it is more important to assess the work of a
political party on the basis of its positions on the respect of
fundamental rights and freedoms and the capacity to prepare
programmes useful to citizens".
He also picked out what he considered to be the most
important parts of the M5S programme.
"First of all, it is necessary to drastically abolish useless
laws," he said.
"There are many more than the 400 Luigi Di Maio talked about.
"Second, it is necessary to reinforce anti-corruption
legislation featuring initiatives that operate in the dark area
that proceeds corruption.
"Third, the bad school reform should be completely revised,"
he said, referring to the centre-left's 'good school' education
reform.
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