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Italian politicians preach to the converted
Sunday, April 2, 2006
This means the center-right and center-left are focusing efforts on preventing sluggish sympathizers from abstaining, warning of a hellish future if their adversaries should win
CRISPIAN BALMER
ROME - Reuters
Fear and loathing stalk Italy's election campaign, as politicians try to coax disillusioned supporters into turning out to vote by painting dark visions of what will happen if they don't.
Pollsters expect no major swing of allegiance from one bloc to the other in the days left before the April 9-10 vote, with Italians staying loyal to their political roots.
This means the center-right and center-left are focusing efforts on preventing sluggish sympathizers from abstaining, warning of a hellish future if their adversaries should win.
"Very few Italian voters are prepared to switch political affiliation throughout their whole lifetime," said Andrea Vannucci, a political statistics analyst.
"Given this, it is clear the two blocs are trying to persuade their potential electorate to vote, rather than trying to poach voters from the other side."
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has trailed in the opinion polls since early 2004. Before a poll blackout came into force last weekend, he was between 3.5 and 5.0 percentage points behind his center-left challenger, Romano Prodi.
The opposition has managed to maintain a steady lead for the past month. Some 23 percent of the electorate remained undecided when opinion polls closed last week, meaning the result could still swing right.
But most of the "undecided" are already locked into one or other bloc. The uncertainties lie only in whether they will actually vote and which party of the two blocs they plump for.
"You can't rule out a center-right victory, but if they did win it would be with a very, very small majority," said Carla Natali, a director of pollsters TNS Abacus.
Alarm bells:Given that he has to play catch-up, it is unsurprising that Berlusconi has led the way in alarmist campaigning.
He intones daily that the center left will hike taxes, warns that Communists have a history of eating babies, says homeowners face economic ruin under Prodi and bows to anti-immigrant fears by saying "we don't want a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural" Italy.
"Are we selling fear now? Yes, because the left makes people scared," an unrepentant Berlusconi told reporters this week.
Berlusconi is convinced a high turnout in April will benefit his coalition, with his own pollsters suggesting that if 82 percent of the electorate votes, the center right will win. In 2001, turnout was 81 percent.
Independent experts are sceptical, seeing no correlation between high turnout and center right victories. They point out the "undecided" are not all closet Berlusconi fans.
"In fact, the majority of the undecided indicated they were leaning more to the center left," said TNS Abacus's Natali.
A TNS analysis of the waverers showed center right sympathizers were hesitating because they were disappointed Berlusconi had not done more to boost the stagnant economy.
The undecided in the center left camp complained that Prodi's programme was unclear and feared his broad coalition, which stretches from Roman Catholic centrists to hardcore Communists, would not hold together once in power.
Remarkably, the election campaign has thrown up no memorable slogans and virtually no headline-grabbing promises.
The center right manifesto contains just 10 brief points, eight of which start: "We will continue to..." The center-left manifesto is 281 pages long, but short on detail.
Negatives count:There has been little debate on many of the core issues facing Italy -- such as how to reduce its debt mountain.
"Sadly in Italy you don't vote for something, you vote against someone," said Aldo Martelli, a Bologna doctor.
"The thing that unites the left is a hatred of Berlusconi. The thing that unites the right is a hatred of communism."
Given the dire state of Italian finances it is perhaps unsurprising that neither bloc has focused on engaging the electorate in how it plans to clear things up.
Plans by Prodi to raise taxes on interest income from state bonds has been leapt on by Berlusconi as a sign of things to come if the center left should win, triggering an avalanche of name-calling on both sides.
The poisoned atmosphere means many voters have switched off, with a poll in Il Sole 24 Ore daily this week saying 17.8 percent of Italians did not even know the election date.
"This campaign has been awful with people just calling each other 'cretin' all the time," said Arnaldo Zotti, a 68-year-old pensioner from Milan.
"I still don't know who I'll vote for. Perhaps I'll just write some expletive on the ballot and leave it at that."
Sunday, April 2, 2006
This means the center-right and center-left are focusing efforts on preventing sluggish sympathizers from abstaining, warning of a hellish future if their adversaries should win
CRISPIAN BALMER
ROME - Reuters
Fear and loathing stalk Italy's election campaign, as politicians try to coax disillusioned supporters into turning out to vote by painting dark visions of what will happen if they don't.
Pollsters expect no major swing of allegiance from one bloc to the other in the days left before the April 9-10 vote, with Italians staying loyal to their political roots.
This means the center-right and center-left are focusing efforts on preventing sluggish sympathizers from abstaining, warning of a hellish future if their adversaries should win.
"Very few Italian voters are prepared to switch political affiliation throughout their whole lifetime," said Andrea Vannucci, a political statistics analyst.
"Given this, it is clear the two blocs are trying to persuade their potential electorate to vote, rather than trying to poach voters from the other side."
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi has trailed in the opinion polls since early 2004. Before a poll blackout came into force last weekend, he was between 3.5 and 5.0 percentage points behind his center-left challenger, Romano Prodi.
The opposition has managed to maintain a steady lead for the past month. Some 23 percent of the electorate remained undecided when opinion polls closed last week, meaning the result could still swing right.
But most of the "undecided" are already locked into one or other bloc. The uncertainties lie only in whether they will actually vote and which party of the two blocs they plump for.
"You can't rule out a center-right victory, but if they did win it would be with a very, very small majority," said Carla Natali, a director of pollsters TNS Abacus.
Alarm bells:Given that he has to play catch-up, it is unsurprising that Berlusconi has led the way in alarmist campaigning.
He intones daily that the center left will hike taxes, warns that Communists have a history of eating babies, says homeowners face economic ruin under Prodi and bows to anti-immigrant fears by saying "we don't want a multi-ethnic, multi-cultural" Italy.
"Are we selling fear now? Yes, because the left makes people scared," an unrepentant Berlusconi told reporters this week.
Berlusconi is convinced a high turnout in April will benefit his coalition, with his own pollsters suggesting that if 82 percent of the electorate votes, the center right will win. In 2001, turnout was 81 percent.
Independent experts are sceptical, seeing no correlation between high turnout and center right victories. They point out the "undecided" are not all closet Berlusconi fans.
"In fact, the majority of the undecided indicated they were leaning more to the center left," said TNS Abacus's Natali.
A TNS analysis of the waverers showed center right sympathizers were hesitating because they were disappointed Berlusconi had not done more to boost the stagnant economy.
The undecided in the center left camp complained that Prodi's programme was unclear and feared his broad coalition, which stretches from Roman Catholic centrists to hardcore Communists, would not hold together once in power.
Remarkably, the election campaign has thrown up no memorable slogans and virtually no headline-grabbing promises.
The center right manifesto contains just 10 brief points, eight of which start: "We will continue to..." The center-left manifesto is 281 pages long, but short on detail.
Negatives count:There has been little debate on many of the core issues facing Italy -- such as how to reduce its debt mountain.
"Sadly in Italy you don't vote for something, you vote against someone," said Aldo Martelli, a Bologna doctor.
"The thing that unites the left is a hatred of Berlusconi. The thing that unites the right is a hatred of communism."
Given the dire state of Italian finances it is perhaps unsurprising that neither bloc has focused on engaging the electorate in how it plans to clear things up.
Plans by Prodi to raise taxes on interest income from state bonds has been leapt on by Berlusconi as a sign of things to come if the center left should win, triggering an avalanche of name-calling on both sides.
The poisoned atmosphere means many voters have switched off, with a poll in Il Sole 24 Ore daily this week saying 17.8 percent of Italians did not even know the election date.
"This campaign has been awful with people just calling each other 'cretin' all the time," said Arnaldo Zotti, a 68-year-old pensioner from Milan.
"I still don't know who I'll vote for. Perhaps I'll just write some expletive on the ballot and leave it at that."
