Thursday,
November 8, 2012. Frictions between Silvio Berlusconi and Angelino
Alfano become clear on a press conference following a long-drawn-out
meeting on the candidates for the PdL primary election. And the
future of the People of Liberty party becomes cloudier.
Silvio
Berlusconi does not really like primary elections and does not trust
that much in Angelino Alfano (Berlusconi's former heir apparent and
PdL's secretary) capabilities. That's quite clear now. Even though
Alfano – former Italian Minister of Justice (and Keeper of the
Seals) – was directly chose my the Italian media tycoon.
The
former Italian PM already (more or less) agreed on holding primary
elections on the 16th of December (in order to decide the
premier candidate and a new name for the fell-from-grace People of
Freedom Party), but – disclosing the results of an opinion poll he
had commissioned earlier that bore quite bad news – he is now
convinced that only a “shock” therapy could revive the party;
there's a need for a “Berlusconi of '94”, he said during the last
meeting at Palazzo Grazioli held with their allies to discuss the details of the
elections.
And
when the Italian Silvio talks about “shock”, he means that he
will pull a rabbit out of his hat, he is quoted to had said during
the meeting, the only difference is that this time – instead of a
rabbit – it “will be a dinosaur”. It sounded like a promise (or
a threat, depending on the point of view), but it's honestly
difficult to see how Berlusconi - who was recently convicted of tax fraud
and is currently on trial for allegedly having had sex with an
under-age prostitute – could represent (again!) a credible
candidate to lead Italy.
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“The
primary elections does not represent the redemption of the party”
said Berlusconi, but he become a minority when he tried to substitute
votes with a call centre lead polling or the hand-picked choice of a
new candidate by himself. Alfano dismissed this by saying they don't
need ice-cream vendors (alluding to the Italian ice-cream company GROM's founder, Guido Martinetti, allegedly considered as a potential leader of the party), stand-up comedians (possibly Berlusconi himself?) and showgirls (the list is quite long, actually...
Iliana Calabrò is just the newest of Silvio's favourites), and the
meeting seemed to result in an internal row.
During
the following press conference Mr Berlusconi decided to pick up Monti
government on its policies that “lead to recession and hurt the
country”. Berlusconi also stressed that “all the fundamental
figures [about unemployment, industrial production, and so on] of the
country have worsened over the past year”.
But
then he added: "We will not lead our election against Monti”
because it could be counterproductive for the PdL. So – as Alfano
put it – the PdL is not in favour of Monti's government, but they
are not against it either.
Looks
like the umpteenth PdL gathering brought more questions, than
answers: will the PdL survive, yes or no? Will Angelino Alfano be the
successor of SB, yes or no? Will Berlusconi get something out of his
hat? Will it be a rabbit or a dinosaur?
