Il Cavaliere No More: Expulsion Spells Berlusconi's Demise

[unhappycamper]

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/silvio-berlusconi-may-go-to-jail-after-senate-expulsion-a-936127.html



By voting to expel former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, the Italian Senate has brought a long struggle to an end. The controversial former leader now faces new legal threats -- and maybe even a lengthy jail term.

Il Cavaliere No More: Expulsion Spells Berlusconi's Demise
By Hans-Jürgen Schlamp
November 28, 2013 – 12:57 PM

As recently as Monday, former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi was hosting "the most powerful man in the world" -- his "friend" Vladimir Putin, as he calls him. On Wednesday, his situation became considerably less impressive: In an anxiously awaited decision, a majority of members of the Italian Senate voted to throw the former prime minister out of parliament as a result of his conviction for tax evasion in the so-called Mediaset trial.

The 77-year-old head of the revived conservative Forza Italia party has vigorously been fighting this outcome. Italian law calls for him to give up his seat as a result of criminal conviction, but he has been asking for an exception, calling the effort to remove him a campaign by his enemies. To maintain his position, he threatened, and failed, to topple the coalition government of Prime Minister Enrico Letta in October. But now it appears that Berlusconi has been vanquished.

Although he swears he will be back in Italy's Palazzo Chigi, the seat of the prime minister, in 2015, that would be impossible. According to a law approved by his party in Dec. 31, 2012, he is banned from running for a parliamentary seat, let alone the office of the prime minister, for six years.

He will also be unable to defeat Letta's government. Berlusconi's former party, People of Liberty (PdL) has split and one part will continue governing with the Social Democrats under Letta for the rest of the legislative period. This coalition has a comfortable majority in the Chamber of Deputies and a narrow, but sufficient six-vote majority in the Senate. Berlusconi and his loyalists can vote however they want -- it won't change anything.

[idwiyo]

1. k&r Long overdue. Best example of conservative arsehole.