Romano Prodi just declared victory in the Italian elections.
Reuters just reported that, although close, the Center Left has declared victory. When will Blair go down in the slow collapase of the coalition of the lying?
Reuters
ROME (Reuters) - Romano Prodi said early on Tuesday that his center-left alliance had defeated Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in Italy's general election.
"We have won," Prodi told flag-waving supporters in a packed Rome square.
Piero Fassino, leader of the Democrats of the Left party, said: "The data show that the center-left has won the election."
[UPDATE 7:55]
Note the vote and the seats (seggi) won by Prodi's "Unione" ("Union") coalition vs. Berlusconi's "Casa delle Liberta" ("House of Freedoms"). It is very close in the Senate but the other House seems to be more promising given reports in the Italian papers despite the razor margin.
La Stampa
Romano Prodi has claimed victory for his centre-left coalition in the lower house, following Italy's election.
Mr Prodi made the claim during a rally in the capital Rome, telling cheering supporters that "victory has arrived".
But the claim has been contested by the centre-right coalition of Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi - who has led the country for five years.
Provisional official results show the centre-left winning 49.8% of the vote against 49.7% to the centre-right.
"Today, we have turned a page," Mr Prodi told a crowd from a makeshift stage outside the headquarters of his Union coalition in central Rome.
"We will always be united. We will govern for five years."
However Mr Berlusconi's spokesman Paolo Bonaiuti told reporters the centre-right coalition would demand a "scrupulous" check of election ballots.
The winning coalition will automatically be awarded 55% of the seats under a new electoral law.
Berlusconi's bloc hold a one-seat lead in the Senate, according to exit polls, but results are still not in for six seats in the upper house.
The lower and upper houses have equal power in Italy's electoral system. One bloc must win both to prevent the country being locked in parliamentary stalemate.
BBC
This was a tough election that might result in confusion and political battles that will continue after the count.The Globe and Mail provides some backgorund.
ROME -- By the end of today the flamboyant Silvio Berlusconi may become the first prime minister in Italian history to be elected to two consecutive terms, or he may be replaced by his mild-mannered opponent Romano Prodi. Or, equally likely, he may have cast his country into a period of dangerous instability.
As one of the nastiest and strangest election campaigns in modern European history ground to a halt this weekend for two days of voting that end this afternoon, Mr. Berlusconi threatened to challenge the results. With his coalition of right-wing parties polling almost 50-50 against Mr. Prodi's coalition of left-wing, moderate and Catholic parties, Italy could easily return to the sort of instability of the period between 1945 and 2001, when 56 governments were elected.
As if to guarantee an unstable result, in his final speech on Saturday, Mr. Berlusconi threatened to bring in United Nations observers, implying that he would not accept the results of a negative vote.
"There's a clear alliance between the major newspapers, the banks and the courts to plot against me," said Mr. Berlusconi, who owns or controls all seven of Italy's TV networks. "With the newspapers on their side and the TV stations behaving as if they are, we need United Nations observers to monitor electoral fraud."
Such instability may be welcomed by some. Some members of Mr. Berlusconi's Forza Italia coalition said they would like it to fall apart so something better could be created.
Two parties of the moderate left, Margherita and Democratic Left, are hoping to create a new coalition of centrist parties similar to those elsewhere in Europe. They have said privately that a political meltdown may help their cause.
Link
Some strange happenings from the election:
Mr. Prodi, 70, who served as Italian prime minister in the 1990s and later as European Union commissioner, is known for his fiscal rigour. He spent much of the campaign boasting of his boring, "calm" personality, a pointed contrast to Mr. Berlusconi's penchant for outrageous remarks.
It may have worked. As the campaign went on, Mr. Berlusconi likened himself to Jesus, claimed that the Chinese boil their babies, and characterized his opponents as "dickheads."
Such comments meant that Mr. Berlusconi dominated the front pages of Italian newspapers on almost every day of the election campaign, leading Mr. Prodi's advisers to attempt a few awkward efforts at flashiness.
On Tuesday, the chubby Mr. Prodi jumped onto the back of a motorcycle, driven by an aide, and took a wild ride through the streets of Rome, leading one newspaper to liken him to Audrey Hepburn in the movie Roman Holiday.
Never to be outdone, Mr. Berlusconi managed to end his campaigning Saturday on a characteristically embarrassing note.
Taking a group of schoolchildren on an impromptu tour of his official residence in Rome, he informed them, without provocation, that "all women over 23 in show business" have had breast enlargements.
Whether that pronouncement marked his last statement in office or not will be known today.
Link