Rome: Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi won a vote of confidence on Friday amid strong reservation.
Berlusconi, who said before the vote that the country would be thrown into economic and social catastrophe if his government was collapsed. He won 316 votes and 301 against.
One coalition parliamentarian, Francesco Nucara, told during the voting that he was voting just to save the government for the good of the country not for Berlusconi.
“You have put some people in your government who would not be worthy to be doorkeepers in some of your companies,” Nucara said in his address before the vote.
Berlusconi was forced to call the vote after his divided and undisciplined coalition suffered an embarrassment when it failed to pass a routine budget provision on Tuesday.
The prime minister was holding a cabinet meeting immediately after the vote to re-present the budget measure defeated on Tuesday, a result that Berlusconi wrote off as just an “accident” because some parliamentarians arrived late.
Berlusconi told parliament on Thursday the fall of his government would be “a victory for those who want to see (Italy) fall into decline, catastrophe and the kind of speculation we have seen for months in Europe and Italy”.
Several newspaper editorials on Friday highlighted the lack of new ideas in Berlusconi’s speech to parliament a day before the vote was taken, describing him as paralysed by a fear of aggravating tensions in his coalition.
“Not one new thought was expressed. Absolutely nothing. A complete vacuum,” said Luca Ricolfi in La Stampa daily.
“Berlusconi has by now become a factor that is immobilising and freezing Italian politics.”
A number of centre-right deputies were absent from Tuesday’s vote, infuriating Berlusconi and feeding suspicions that some stayed away to raise their bargaining power in the coalition.
He is facing internal challenges from a number of ministers, most notably from Economy Minister Giulio Tremonti, who are unhappy with his leadership and the damage his personal and legal woes have done to Italy’s reputation.
The prime minister is on trial in four separate cases, accused of fraud, corruption and paying for sex with a minor.
President Giorgio Napolitano entered the fray this week, expressing deep concern about the viability of government and demanding a “credible response” to Italy’s acute problems.
A Reuters survey of about 20 analysts said on Thursday that Italy was already in recession, would barely muster any growth in 2012 and would miss the government’s fiscal deficit targets.
Its sovereign debt has been downgraded in the past month by Standard & Poor’s, Moody’s and Fitch, and since early August it has relied on the European Central Bank to buy its bonds to prevent yields rising to unsustainable levels.
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