ROME - Italy’s Parliament on Saturday re-elected President Giorgio Napolitano as the nation’s president to an unprecedented second term after party leaders persuaded the aging head of state to serve again in hopes of easing the political gridlock that has delayed the formation of a new government.
The 87-year-old Napolitano easily surpassed the simple majority required to be elected Saturday afternoon. He garnered 738 votes, far more than the 504 needed for victory for another seven-year mandate.
Italy’s presidents traditionally serve only one term, but there is no prohibition against a second mandate.
It took Parliament three days of balloting to choose a president, reflecting the legislature’s deep polarization after inconclusive nationwide elections in February.
Once he takes a new oath of office Monday, Napolitano can formally begin one of the head of state’s most important tasks - figuring out who has the most solid prospects of putting together a new government with enough support to successfully work with Parliament and survive a mandatory vote of confidence.
Italy’s main political parties - essentially three distinct ideological blocs in Parliament and their often-shifting allies - are heavily polarized, and the antagonism only grew sharper during the gridlock this year.
Napolitano, a former communist, will have to quickly start talking to parties about a potential premier. The next government faces pressure to bring urgently needed economic and electoral overhaul to the recession-mired nation.
Italy has had a caretaker government for months, led by economist Mario Monti, a Napolitano appointee whose harsh austerity measures of higher taxes, pension reform and slashed spending helped keep Italy from succumbing to the debt crisis.
Napolitano, citing his advanced age, had repeatedly refused to be a candidate for another term that would see him be nearly 95 when it runs out. But he explained that he yielded to the appeals out of a sense of responsibility toward the nation.
“We must all look, as I tried to do in these hours, at the difficult situation of the country, at the problems of Italy and Italians, and the international image and role of our nation,” Napolitano said in brief remarks from the presidential palace after his re-election. He said he would elaborate on how he planned to carry out his mandate in a speech Monday.
Monti, whose own election bid to stay on as premier was soundly rejected by angry voters, telephoned Napolitano to thank him for having agreed “with great spirit of sacrifice” to continue.
From Brussels, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said in a congratulatory note that Napolitano will serve at a time when EU nations must “display great calmness, courage and farsightedness” amid calls from Europe’s citizens for restored growth and jobs.
Still, though Napolitano’s election received a standing ovation from lawmakers and plaudits from abroad, outside Parliament a noisy rally of several thousand people protested, disappointed that Italy’s old political guard hadn’t changed as they had hoped.
Lawmakers from Parliament’s third-largest bloc, the anti-establishment 5 Star Movement led by comic-turned-political-agitatorBeppe Grillo, galvanized supporters for the protest. Grillo had backed a left-leaning constitutional law expert for president.
It is possible Napolitano might only hope to serve part of the term, long enough to encourage agreement over the leader and makeup of the next government and to shepherd the electoral changes he had hoped would have been enacted before February’s election, to boost chances for a more stable and productive Parliament.
Among those beaming and applauding Napolitano’s re-election was Silvio Berlusconi. The conservative billionaire businessman fell short in a comeback attempt in February elections for a fourth term as premier.
Berlusconi is eager to have a government that might rein in Italian prosecutors, who he contends sides with the left and are responsible for his judicial woes, including a trial in Milan for purportedly paying an underage teenage woman for sex. Berlusconi has proclaimed his innocence.
Also lobbying the president was Democratic Party leader Pier Luigi Bersani, whose lawmakers cast blank ballots Saturday morning in a stalling tactic as he struggled to find a candidate supported by a wide consensus. The Democratic Party has been imploding under a leadership crisis since disappointing results in parliamentary elections. Bersani’s forces control the Chamber of Deputies, but not the Senate. Tapped by Napolitano to see whether he could pull together a government before the presidential election, Bersani failed after refusing an offer by Berlusconi to join their bitterly opposed forces in a reform-focused coalition.
Information for this article was contributed by Geir Moulson of The Associated Press.
Front Section, Pages 11 on 04/21/2013