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September 29, 2013

Resignations in Italy Put Government in Crisis

By ELISABETTA POVOLEDO

ROME — Prime Minister Enrico Letta said that he would call for a confidence vote in Parliament, most likely on Wednesday, to clear up the political uncertainty surrounding his fragile government after the sudden resignation of five ministers belonging to Silvio Berlusconi’s center-right party.

In the vote, “everyone will assume their own responsibility, all above board,” Mr. Letta said on Italian television Sunday night, shortly after meeting with President Giorgio Napolitano to discuss the government crisis prompted by the walkout.

The unexpected move on Saturday by Mr. Berlusconi’s allies raised concerns that Italy’s troubles may threaten the current political and financial stability in Europe. Political commentators speculated gloomily over the weekend about how the financial markets would react on Monday.

Mr. Letta also made clear that he would no longer be bound by the whims of Mr. Berlusconi’s People of Liberty party, which has been a mainstay of Italy’s broad coalition government, formed five months ago after elections in February failed to produce a clear majority.

“I have no intention to govern at all costs,” he said on Sunday. “Today the conditions are to have the confidence of Parliament — not for three days, but to go ahead and apply a program.”

Tensions within the coalition government erupted as a Senate committee prepared to decide whether Mr. Berlusconi would retain his seat in the upper house, after his conviction last month in a tax fraud case. He is supposed to begin serving a one-year sentence, most likely in the form of house arrest, in mid-October.

The ostensible breaking point for Mr. Berlusconi was the government’s failure to take measures to stop a scheduled increase of one percentage point in the country’s value-added tax, to 22 percent. He said on Sunday that his party had promised during the election campaign to halt the increase, and that the only alternative was to hold early elections.

But Mr. Napolitano said on Sunday that he would not call a new election unless all other possibilities were exhausted first.

There were signs that not all of Mr. Berlusconi’s party agreed with his decision to withdraw from the government. The party’s five ministers evidently were not consulted; several of them issued statements questioning the decision-making process that led to the sudden demand that they resign. The dissent within the party raised the possibility that some disaffected People of Liberty lawmakers might give Mr. Letta the votes he needs to survive the confidence vote.

“There is a climate of evident uncertainly regarding the possible developments of the political situation,” Mr. Napolitano said in a note issued Sunday. Parliament, he said, is the “proper place for clarification.”