Prodi claims victory in Italian election
Official results today showed Romano Prodi won enough seats in the Italian parliamentary election to become prime minister, but Premier Silvio Berlusconi refused to concede defeat.
The Interior Ministry has assigned Prodi’s centre-left coalition four Senate seats chosen by Italians voting abroad, giving him the margin he needs to win both houses of Italy’s parliament.
But shortly after, Berlusconi said: “Nobody now can say they have won.”
Berlusconi said the overseas vote that decided the final Senate seats was far from decided, saying there were “many irregularities and it’s possible that we won’t be able to confirm that it has been a valid vote.”
He said that the “necessary legal verification procedures” must be completed.
Final returns had already given Prodi’s coalition the lower Chamber of Deputies, although Berlusconi’s forces had already contested that result.
Prodi told a news conference that his government would be “politically and technically” strong, rebutting concerns about his slim margin of victory and concerns that it would be too weak to enact necessary reforms to bring Italy out of its economic slump.
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