Italian regional elections get off to slow start

Rome - Only about 10 per cent of the electorate had turned up by midday to vote in Italy's regional elections on Sunday, 3 percentage points less than in the elections of five years ago, the Interior Ministry reported.

Voters in 13 of the country's 20 regions have until Monday 3 pm (1300 GMT) to go to the ballot boxes.

Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom Party (PDL) is attempting to wrest control of 11 of those regions from the center-left, led by the main opposition Democratic Party.

The 73-year-old billionaire and media magnate has declared the regional elections to be a "national test" for his conservative coalition government, which he has led for two years.

The most recent polls have predicted that the prime minister faces a low turn-out and losses for his anti-immigrant coalition partner, the Northern League.

Berlusconi's alleged attempts to avoid corruption charges by changing the law, as well as further corruption scandals embroiling members of the PDL and its allies are said to have led to disillusionment among voters.

In addition, the PDL has suffered the embarrassment of having several of its candidates excluded from standing in Rome's Lazio region, after party officials missed a deadline to submit its list of candidates.

Source: Earth Times.
Link: http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/316166,italian-regional-elections-get-off-to-slow-start.html.