Matteo Renzi, the PD secretary and current mayor of Florence, walks next to a car in the courtyard of his home at Pontassieve, near Florence, yesterday. Photo: Reuters

Italian President Giorgio Napolitano yesterday summoned Matteo Renzi to a meeting today at which he is expected to ask the centre-left leader to form a government that must overhaul one of the most troubled economies in the euro zone.

Napolitano is likely to ask the slick-talking mayor of Florence to form the country’s 65th government since World War Two in the meeting, which a statement from the president’s office said was scheduled for 10.30am in Rome.

Enrico Letta resigned as prime minister on Friday after his Democratic Party (PD) forced him to make way for Renzi, 39, who is promising radical reforms to the euro zone’s third-biggest economy and a government that can survive until 2018.

Renzi would become the youngest prime minister in Italian history. But to take power he will need the support of a centre-right rival, and if he gets it, he will become the third premier in a row picked by the president and not by popular vote.

This process is not widely welcomed in a country where a long-entrenched political elite, resistant to reform, has grown unpopular due to systemic corruption and mismanagement.

“Renzi committed an original sin, which is that he will become prime minister without an election,” said Giovanni Orsina, deputy head of Rome’s Luiss School of Government. “Now in order to make that original sin forgotten, he needs to govern very effectively.”

After getting a mandate from the President, Renzi will have to strike a deal with the small New Centre Right (NCD) party, whose support the PD needs to command a parliamentary majority.

The party, which split from ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi last year, said it wants to see a written programme that puts a clear centre-right stamp on tax, jobs and family policies before backing Renzi.

On the economic front the two sides are likely to find common ground. Renzi has already said he backs lower taxes affecting employment, but they differ on social issues such as immigration and laws allowing gay and lesbian civil partnerships. “We are decisive. If we say no to the government, it will not be born,” NCD leader Angelino Alfano said at a party rally yesterday.

Backroom horse-trading for key posts in Renzi’s cabinet by the NCD and other small allies is in full swing, Italian media said yesterday, and once completed, Renzi must swear in his team and seek confidence votes in both houses of Parliament.

Then the government will take the helm of an economy that grew by a meagre 0.1 percent in the fourth quarter of last year.