Italy’s Socialist P.M. gets down to business

Press, 6 August 1983, Page 11

Italy’s Socialist P.M. gets down to business

NZPA-Reuter Rome Italy’s first Socialist Prime Minister, Mr Bettino Craxi, began getting organised yesterday for the job of trying to implement a promised programme of tough economic measures aimed at bringing down inflation and curtailing the fast-growing public deficit. Mr Craxi was chairing the initial meeting of a coalition dominated by the Christian Democrats, the country’s biggest political grouping. After being sworn in on Thursday evening by the President, Mr Sandro Pertini, the new Prime Minister’s first task will be to agree with his colleagues on a list of Ministerial undersecretaries reflecting the make-up of his five-party coalition Government.

The Opposition Communists have already accused Mr Craxi of playing into the hands of the Christian Democrats, who hold 15 of the 28 Cabinet posts, including the Vice-Prime Ministership, the Treasury, and the Foreign Affairs and Interior Ministries. He faces a routine Parliamentary vote of confidence

on Tuesday where he will outline his Government programme, with its main proposal for an all-embracing incomes policy to keep wages, prices, and taxes under control. Mr Craxi’s Cabinet is Italy’s forty-fourth since World War 11.

He spent two weeks negotiating its formation with leaders of the Social Democrats, Republicans, and Liberals, as well as the Christian Democrats.

Mr Craxi is only the second post-war Prime Minister not to be drawn from the Christian Democrat Party. The Republican, Giovanni Spadolini, was the first in 1981-82. The Christian Democrats agreed to surrender the top post after their share of the national vote plunged more than 5 per cent to under 23 per cent in the General Election in June.

But they will dominate Mr Craxi’s Administration. The Socialists will have only five Cabinet jobs compared with the eight in the previous Government led by the Christian Democrat, Amintore Fanfani, showing that Mr Craxi has made big

concessions in exchange for his post. Thursday’s swearing-in ceremony was marred by a last-minute change after a Social Democrat, Michele di Giesi, said that he did not want the post of Regional Affairs Minister.

Mr di Giesi was replaced by a party colleague, Pier Luigi Romita. Prominent figues in the new Government include the Christian Democrat Foreign Minister, Mr Giulio Andreotti, a foreign affairs specialist who led five governments, the last in 1979. Mr Andreotti succeeds his veteran party colleague, Emilio Colombo, who had been unwilling to quit and turned down offers of other posts he considered less prestigious, political sources said.

Mr Spadolini replaces a Socialist, Lelio Lagorio, as Defence Minister and a Christian Democrat, Mr Giovanni Goria, stays in the Treasury. A former Prime Minster, Arnaldo Forlani, leader of a minority faction of the dominant Christian Democrats, fills the new post of Deputy Prime Minister.