ROME — Prime Minister Matteo Renzi of Italy announced Monday that he will resign after suffering a stinging loss in a constitutional referendum, triggering immediate calls from a populist party and other opposition forces for elections to be held soon.
Those voting no “have won in an extraordinary clear-cut way,’’ Renzi told reporters in Rome about an hour after polls had closed in Sunday’s balloting.
‘‘I lost and the post that gets eliminated is mine,’’ Renzi said. ‘‘The government’s experience is over, and in the afternoon I’ll go to the Quirinal Hill to hand in my resignation’’ to President Sergio Mattarella.
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Leaders of the populist 5-Star Movement, which is led by comic Beppe Grillo, joined the chorus for early elections. The 5-Stars are the chief rivals of Renzi’s Democrats and are anxious to achieve national power for the first time.
With ballots counted from nearly half of the polling stations, the ‘‘No’’ votes were running at nearly 60 percent to 40 percent for the ‘‘Yes’’ votes on changes Renzi claimed were vital to modernize Italy.
Mattarella as head of state would have to decide whether to accept any resignation. Renzi is expected to be asked to stay on at least until a budget bill can be passed later this month and to shepherd a months-long electoral overhaul process.
The thorough rejection of Renzi’s efforts to simplify Italy’s lawmaking process was a boost for the country’s antiestablishment forces just weeks after Donald Trump won the US presidential election.
It was the latest in a string of electoral setbacks for the status quo in Europe beginning with Britain’s vote to leave the European Union. Like voters in the rest of the West, Italians are split on issues including immigration and free trade.
A populist takeover of Italy is still uncertain because the Renzi’s center-left Democratic Party remains in control of Parliament and national elections do not have to be held until 2018. But much will depend on the makeup of the next government and how the anti-immigrant, euroskeptic parties capitalize on their success.
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Renzi’s loss also could cause financial upheaval in Europe’s third-largest economy, as Italy’s weak banks struggle to contain the fallout. The euro dropped 1 percent against the dollar in early Asian trading after the release of exit polls.
European partners were closely monitoring the vote, which came on the same day as a presidential runoff in Austria in which voters rejected a right-wing populist’s bid to become president for the first time since World War II.
The Italian referendum aimed to streamline Italy’s cumbersome lawmaking process by reducing the powers of the Senate, while also removing some key decision-making powers from regions.
Renzi had argued that the changes would dismantle bureaucracy, make Italy more attractive to investors, and help his drive to transform the country.
Three former premiers — Silvio Berlusconi, Massimo D'Alema, and Mario Monti — have come out against the constitutional changes, but for different reasons. Berlusconi argued that it would concentrate too much power in the prime minister, while Monti said the changes don’t go far enough and downplayed the risk of political instability.
Italian opposition leader Matteo Salvini, of the anti-immigrant Northern League, hailed Sunday’s referendum as a ‘‘victory of the people against the strong powers of three-quarters of the world.’’
The self-assured Renzi late last year pledged to offer his resignation if the referendum on overhauling a good part of the 1948 Constitution went down to defeat. That was months before Britain’s David Cameron made his ill-fated bet on the referendum on whether the UK should stay in the European Union. He lost that bet.
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In Italy, the referendum was required because the changes were approved by less than two-thirds of Parliament.
But Renzi raised the stakes, turning the referendum into a virtual plebiscite on himself, when he pledged to quit if Italians turned their back on the government overhaul.
Some opposition leaders started clamoring for early elections after Renzi’s measure went down to defeat. ‘‘We are ready to vote as soon as possible,’’ Salvini told reporters.
Some of Renzi’s political opponents were hoping to tap into the populist sentiment that has been gaining ground with the UK vote in June to leave the European Union and the US presidential victory last month by Trump.
Renzi had been hoping to survive the rising populist forces that have gained traction across the world.
A ‘‘Yes’’ vote would have strengthened Renzi’s 2½-year-old government, giving it impetus to complete its five-year term and time to prepare for elections in 2018, while a ‘‘No’’ vote favored early elections sometime next year.