Italy’s leader faces test

Rome: Democratic Party chief Pier Luigi Bersani won primaries on Sunday to lead Italy’s centre-left but now faces the challenge of uniting different currents in his party, Italian media reported on Monday.

“A new life is beginning for the leader of the Democratic Party. The most difficult one,” the centre-left La Repubblica daily said.

“The primaries have created a new party, which has already changed both internally and in terms of its image externally,” it said.

Bersani won out against his more centrist rival, Florence mayor Matteo Renzi, making him a favourite to be Italy’s next prime minister.

All recent opinion polls point to the Democratic Party as the winner of a general election expected in March or April next year.

The 37-year-old Renzi’s strong showing in the primaries is seen as reflecting a desire for renewal within the Democratic Party, many of whose members like Bersani himself are former members of the Italian Communist Party.

The top-selling Corriere della Sera daily said Bersani’s victory made him “an independent and weighty candidate for the post of prime minister”.

“In order to last and have credibility in Italy and abroad, he cannot give in to those who consider the Monti experience a surrender to liberalism,” it said, in reference to Italy’s current Prime Minister Mario Monti.

Monti has implemented an ambitious programme of austerity and reforms since coming to power in November 2011 and many Italians are feeling the pinch.

La Stampa daily said Bersani now had to “unite the runners-up” from the primary race including supporters of Renzi and Nichi Vendola, governor of the Puglia region and a traditional leftist fiercely opposed to Monti’s policies.