Italy: Italy's centre-left "Union" coalition led by former European Commission president Romano Prodi is today widely expected to secure a narrow general election victory over the centre-right "House of Freedom" coalition led by prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.
Polling stations opened at 8am yesterday morning and closed at 3pm at the end of the traditional two-day vote. Although exit poll assessments will be available within minutes of the closure of polling stations, the first projections based on the actual vote will not emerge until late this afternoon.
At the end of a bitter, often ill-tempered campaign, the 47 million-strong Italian electorate is called on to choose between two radically different candidates, two men who have previously gone head to head in 1996, when Mr Prodi was the winner.
Mr Berlusconi, Italy's richest man and the owner of a huge media empire, portrays himself as the champion of free market forces attempting to cut a swathe through a bureaucratically top-heavy Italy. He has conducted a highly personalised, theatrical and aggressive campaign in which he has accused the centre-left of being the party "of taxes and hatred" and of making political use of "leftist magistrates" to eliminate him from political life.
Mr Prodi has tried to avoid mudslinging, instead concentrating on the need to "get Italy going again" and insisting that five years of Mr Berlusconi's government have left Italy in a state of cultural, political and, above all, economic crisis.
Where Mr Berlusconi has tried to rekindle former fears about "communists" in government, Mr Prodi, the former Christian Democrat, has spoken of solidarity, arguing that his rival is waging a campaign based on instigating fear and uncertainty.
The difference between the two men was illustrated in the closing words of their final rallies on Friday evening. In a reference to one of his campaign gaffes, Mr Berlusconi, in Naples, said his coalition would win "because we are not prick heads (coglioni)" .
The prime minister last week suggested that anyone who voted for the centre-left was a coglione. In contrast, Mr Prodi concluded his Rome rally by saying he hoped to work to make Italy "a great country again" and make Italians "happy".
At the end of five years of often polemical government, even today's vote is itself controversial. Last November, the Berlusconi government reformed the electoral system, abolishing the 75 per cent first-past-the-post, single-seat constituency system used since 1994, replacing it with 100 per cent proportional representation. This means Italy has been divided into huge constituencies, 27 for the lower house and 20 for the senate.
No names appear on the ballot sheet with voters being asked instead to vote for a party symbol. Even if party lists may be found outside the polling station, this system means that, in effect, the voter does not know to whom his or her vote has gone, only to which party. To win a seat, a party linked to a coalition needs a minimum of 2 per cent of the vote, while a party running on its own needs 4 per cent.
Both coalitions are wide ranging with the centre-right list containing 15 different parties, led by Mr Berlusconi's Forza Italia but also including Alleanza Nazionale, the Northern League, the ex-Christian Democrat UDC, as well as various former socialist, former liberal and extreme right- wing parties, including that led by Alessandra Mussolini, granddaughter of Benito Mussolini. The centre-left list has 17 components and is equally wide ranging, led by Mr Prodi's Olive Tree grouping which is dominated by the Democratic Left (ex-PCI) and by the Margherita parties, while others on the list include Rifondazione Communista, the Radicals, the Italian Communists, the Greens and the small party of former anti-corruption investigator Antonio Di Pietro.
All in all, 174 parties or movements will appear on Italian ballot sheets which are so long that, in some constituencies, they have to be folded into six parts. A nine-person delegation from the OECD, led by American Peter Eicher, is in Italy to monitor the election. Mr Berlusconi has warned against unspecified, possible electoral fraud.
A key factor in determining today's result may be the electoral turnout. In 2001, 81 per cent voted. If this weekend's turnout were to drop below 80 per cent, many believe that could favour the centre-left, whose voters are traditionally more politicised and committed. At six o'clock yesterday afternoon, the official turnout was significantly lower than in 2001.