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Low turnout on first day of poll

Vaiju Naravane

Italy's 50 million voters to pass verdict on Silvio Berlusconi's rule

Rome: With polling spread over two days in Italy's most bitterly fought general election in recent times, the crowds were thin on Sunday. Many church-going families planned to vote in the afternoon after Mass and Sunday lunch and at mid-morning the turnout was unusually low for a country that often boasts a participation rate of over 70 per cent.

An estimated 50 million are eligible to vote in what has become a referendum for or against Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. The 60,000 polling stations dotting the country will close at 3 p.m. on Monday. Provisional results based on exit polls will be known on Monday evening.

Re-adapted law

Voters will send 630 members to the lower House of Parliament, the Chamber of Deputies, and 315 members to the Senate, under a proportional representation system which has recently been re-adapted after a law in December junked the old, mainly first-past-the-post system.

Mr. Berlusconi heads the conservative Casa delle Liberta or House of Freedoms Alliance, which brings together his own Forza Italia party with the reformed former fascist Alliaza Nazionale, the xenophobic Northern League and a number of small Right-wing parties. His challenger, Romano Prodi, who was chosen to lead the Centre-Left coalition after a U.S. style primary, has no real political base of his own. He has served as Italy's Prime Minister and was the E.U. Commission's President before returning to domestic politics. Mr Prodi's grouping includes the largest individual Opposition party, the Democrats of the Left of Piero Fassino, the moderate Margherita (Daisy) party of Francesco Rutelli, and the country's two Communist parties.

In the polling booths, voters were given ballot papers carrying a long list of parties and symbols. They will vote not for individuals but for party lists. The number of parliamentarians a party gets is in proportion to its share of the vote it gets. Political analysts suggest a high turnout would favour Mr Berlusconi. The newspapers the media tycoon controls — he is also Italy's richest man — have all been urging readers to "vote, vote, vote".

Hard-fought campaign

The sun shone brightly in the working class district of Trastevere where Mr. Romano and his wife Vittoria voted at the nearby secondary school. "Mum is the word. It's secret," Mr. Prodi said. But Ms. Vittoria gave the game away saying, "After all, we are against abortion and homosexuals. The Left will erode our Christian values because all Communists are atheists".

Alessandro, a young law student, has no hesitation in declaring he voted to oust the Prime Minister. "I am against the war in Iraq. Berlusca pushed us into this war despite the fact that 90 per cent of the people were against it. His allies hate foreigners and are hand in glove with the Vatican which dictates Italy's foreign policy. He says he stands for love and freedom but in fact he symbolises corruption, intolerance, hatred of the other and narrow `Christian' values, which essentially means denying people freedom over their own sexuality. We must boot him out in order to win back some dignity. The world is laughing at us," he says. Last Friday, almost 20 per cent of voters were still undecided. The outcome of this hard-fought campaign now lies in their hands.

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