Goodbye Berlusconi, welcome back political turmoil

FAR FROM alleviating Italy’s and Europe’s economic woes, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s political downfall amid the current eurozone crisis brings the risk of even greater political turmoil.  
 
Increasingly absurd figure
In the early 1990s Berlusconi seemed like the saviour of a political system which many saw as broken, says Andrea Mammone in The Independent. Rich and successful, Berlusconi offered “a sort of promised land” and symbolised a certain italianità (Italian-ness) - smart, shrewd, a Latin lover, funny, but also 'status-seeker'.
 
Unfortunately, in recent years, he had become an “increasingly absurd figure”, says Mammone. He governed Italy like a personal business, letting personal interests trump public duties and collective needs, and like the Emperor Nero, “seemed to play the violin while Italy was financially 'burning'”.
 
Berlusconi’s imminent departure is long overdue, says an editorial in The Times. During nine of the past 17 years he has “disgraced himself and humiliated his country with a record of boorishness, fecklessness and ineptitude”. Yet even with him gone, Italy’s economic problems will remain critical and will pose a greater threat to the eurozone than Greece.
 
Departure will strengthen Italy
There’s a big difference between the Greek and Italian crises, says an editorial in The Guardian. In Greece a “patently trustworthy, able and serious man” found himself in charge of a deeply compromised economy and could not muster the resources or support to deal with it. In Italy, “a man whom no one fully trusted for years” was in charge of an economy with both manifest strengths and some obvious weaknesses.
 
George Papandreou’s departure from office will weaken Greece, adds The Guardian. Berlusconi’s fall, assuming it occurs, “will strengthen Italy”.
 
Back to the bad old days
Even with Berlusconi heading for the door, no one is expecting a bright new political or economic dawn, says Michael Day in The Independent. Shares might have surged on news of his political doom, but the real work will take place in the coming weeks to ensure Italy’s political upheavals “are managed in order to avoid financial chaos”. Failure to quickly create a replacement government would be “the doomsday scenario”.
 
While Berlusconi may preside over an economy that is essentially corrupt, says an editorial in The Daily Telegraph, “there is no reason to believe that anyone who succeeds him will be any more capable of delivering the demanded reforms”. For all its faults, Berlusconi’s government has been “among the more able post-war Italian administrations” with a desire for free-market reform.
 
Berlusconi’s fall “is likely to mean a return to the political turbulence of the past”, adds The Telegraph. “An end to bunga bunga may give Italy back a little pride, but it solves nothing”. ·