ROME: Italy’s battered centre-left won the election for mayor of Rome and 15 other major cities yesterday, giving a lift to Prime Minister Enrico Letta and strengthening his leadership of the uneasy coalition with Silvio Berlusconi’s centre-right.
The polls, marred by a low turnout, dealt a blow to both Berlusconi’s People of Freedom (PDL) party and the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement of comic Beppe Grillo, which stunned Italy by gaining a quarter of the vote in national elections in February. The centre-left candidate in Rome, former surgeon Ignazio Marino, took 64 percent of votes in a run-off ballot on Sunday and yesterday, defeating the incumbent Gianni Alemanno.
“Today is a day that the centre-left has won extraordinary results in many cities across Italy,” Marino told reporters. “This is the capital and we need to regain the role of moral leader for our country,” he said.
With around 6 million voters in more than 500 towns and cities, the votes were the Letta government’s first big test since its formation in April following a long stalemate caused by an inconclusive national election in February.
The grand coalition between Letta’s centre-left Democratic Party (PD) and the PDL has aroused little enthusiasm, even among its members, but it was the only viable possibility after no party secured a majority in parliament. Yesterday’s result underlined broad popular disillusionment with Italy’s parties, with a dramatic slump in voter turnout in the capital to 45 percent, down from 63 percent in the run-off in 2008. REUTERS
