Silvio Berlusconi continues to prevail in Italian politics as a close ally warned on Monday that his party could pull out of Prime Minister Enrico Letta's government if a Senate committee refuses to delay a decision on whether to expel the media mogul from parliament.
Centre-right leader Silvio Berlusconi has affirmed that Italy's shaky government, a coalition of his party with the centre left, must continue despite severe tensions after the Supreme Court confirmed his conviction for tax fraud.
Italy's new government line-up brings together personalities from across the political spectrum, from Silvio Berlusconi's apparent successor to a crime fighter and a militant feminist from the radical party. Some of the key names of the ‘grand coalition’ members tasked with tackling the social and economic crisis in recession-hit Italy-.
Silvio Berlusconi, the three-time prime minister and two-time convicted lawbreaker seems to be the great victor in Italy by out-manoeuvring rivals during an eight-week political stalemate and becoming the key figure in talks for a new coalition government.
The leader of Italy's anti-establishment 5-Star Movement, Beppe Grillo, criticised the re-election of President Giorgio Napolitano as a desperate attempt to retain power by a discredited establishment.
Italy's parliament failed to elect a new state president in the first two votes on Thursday with a centre-left rebellion against leader Pier Luigi Bersani torpedoing his official candidate and prolonging a political stalemate.
The head of Italy's centre-left bloc has hit an impasse in his efforts to form a government and said only a mentally ill person would want to govern Italy now. Pier Luigi Bersani was rebuffed by the anti-establishment Five Star Movement on Wednesday.
Italian President Giorgio Napolitano appealed to political leaders to work together to form a government, but his appeal fell on deaf ears and pressure grew for a new poll after last month's deadlocked election. The situation is dominated by the ‘Grilusconi’ phenomenon which mustered a 55% protest vote.
World stock markets and southern European government bonds sank on Tuesday on fears that political stalemate in Italy would leave its economic reforms in tatters and reignite the Euro zone's broader debt crisis.
Italy faced political deadlock on Tuesday after a stunning election that saw the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement of comic Beppe Grillo become the strongest party in the country and left no political group with a clear majority in parliament. The protest vote is also a clear signal of the failure of the EU-German sponsored austerity measures which were implemented by the government of the non-elected technocrat government of Mario Monti.