A political ally of Silvio Berlusconi urged the Italian prime minister to resign and agree on a new government as tension in the coalition mounts.
Gianfranco Fini, who in July broke away from the People of Freedom party he founded with Berlusconi, called for a new government with a “new political agenda” with the support from the opposition Union of Centrists, which previously backed the Berlusconi government between 2001 and 2006.
“Berlusconi needs to show the political courage he’s shown before and take the decision to resign,” Fini, president of the Chamber of Deputies, the lower house of the Italian Parliament, said in a speech near Perugia today and broadcast nationally.
Berlusconi’s governing coalition is under strain after media reports said Berlusconi intervened to free an underage girl from police custody. The 74-year-old leader admitted helping the girl, who had attended a party at one of his private residences near Milan. Opposition leaders called for Berlusconi to step down and a parliamentary committee on security has requested he appear to discuss security issues.
Fini, now head of the Future and Freedom party, which is a coalition partner, was responding to a call by Berlusconi in a televised speech on Nov. 4 for him to openly declare his support for the government or risk early elections. Fini and his allies backed Berlusconi in a confidence vote a month ago that aimed to end a rift on justice and aid to southern Italy.
Staying Put
Berlusconi doesn’t intend to tender his resignation, the Ansa news agency reported, citing unnamed members of his People of Freedom party. Today, Fini said his party’s junior government members, including Deputy Industry Minister Adolfo Urso, will step down should Berlusconi decline to resign.
“The necessary resignation would be from Fini,” Daniele Capezzone, the chief spokesman for the People of Freedom party was cited by Asca, another news agency, as saying.
Fini said last week that Berlusconi should resign if the reports about Berlusconi’s private life are proven true.
“When you are a public figure, you need to set the example,” Fini, 58, said today.
Berlusconi has said the country can’t afford the political instability caused by an election campaign at a time when investors are shunning bonds of Europe’s so called peripheral countries. The yield premium investors demand to hold Italian 10-year bonds over similar maturity German bonds reached a five- week high of 164.4 basis points on Nov. 5.
Election Risk
Early elections would also be a risk for Fini as his new party lags behind Berlusconi in opinion polls.
Berlusconi’s People of Liberty party remains the country’s most popular and would win 29.5 percent of the vote, according to an Ipsos Srl poll published Nov. 3 in Il Sole 24 Ore and conducted before the story of the girl’s release hit newspapers.
His coalition partner, the Northern League, would gain more than 11 percent, the poll found. That compared with 24 percent for the largest opposition bloc, the Democratic Party. Fini’s party had support of 5.1 percent, the poll said.
“Berlusconi shouldn’t resign,” Italian Transport Minister Altero Matteoli said in a statement to the Ansa agency. “We’ll see if we have a majority in parliament. There’s no other government than the one led by Berlusconi.”
. (Source: Bloomberg – Marco Bertacche)
