Fini: Berlusconi behaves like an ‘absolute monarch’

Silvio Berlusconi suffered a fresh blow to his credibility yesterday when he was accused by one of his key political allies, deputy premier Gianfranco Fini, of behaving like an "absolute monarch". Fini also criticised him for demanding immunity from the various legal issues dogging him because of his position.

The under-fire Italian prime minister will be all the more worried by the remarks because Fini recently released a 'political manifesto' which some observers saw as a bid for power.

La Republicca newspaper posted a transcript and recording of Fini's conversation with Nicola Trifuoggi, a prosecutor in Pescara where the People of Freedom politician was attending a prize-giving ceremony. In it Fini is heard to say that "Berlusconi confuses leadership with absolute monarchy" and that he has to remind the prime minister of the victims of the French revolution: "Remember, they were beheaded". Trifuoggi replied that the 73-year-old Berlusconi "was born several centuries too late, [and] would [have] liked to be a Roman emperor."

More damningly, Fini suggested that his immediate boss "confuses the popular consensus, which he naturally has and gives him legitimacy to govern, with a sort of immunity from all authorities of guarantee and control: the judiciary, the Court of Auditors, the Court of Cassation, the head of state, parliament."

Fini, who was the former leader of the neo-fascist MSI party but is now adopting a more liberal, centre-right position, was referring to the prime minister's efforts to gain immunity from a wide range of charges including the bribing of British lawyer David Mills.

The apparent disloyalty of Fini - publicly laughed away by Berlusconi's supporters - is just one of the PM's mounting problems. His estranged wife Veronica Lario is seeking a £38m-a-year divorce settlement, alleging that the billionaire politician had affairs with other women during their relationship. Also, he continues to be ridiculed in the Italian press for his relationship with Patrizia D’Addario, a call girl who claims she slept with the PM in his official residence.

More seriously, on Friday Gaspare Spatuzza, a mafia turncoat, will give evidence in a Turin court claiming that Berlusconi was behind Mafia bomb attacks in Rome, Milan and Florence in 1993. ·