AGAINST A background of increasing internal tensions, the centre-right government of Silvio Berlusconi has suffered a serious blow with the minister for decentralisation announcing his resignation.
Aldo Brancher, the second Berlusconi cabinet minister to resign in the last two months, made his announcement in a Milan trial yesterday where he and his wife stand accused of embezzlement and possession of stolen goods.
The case is linked to their alleged involvement in the fraudulent attempted takeover of the Antonveneto Bank in 2004.
Mr Brancher’s resignation comes at the end of difficult fortnight for the Berlusconi government, marked by internal tensions, strident centre-left opposition and the intervention of state president Giorgio Napolitano.
When Mr Brancher, who was appointed minister on June 18th, immediately invoked ministerial privilege as the reason for not attending a session of the ongoing Antoveneto trial in Milan, opposition forces protested vigorously.
In an untypical move, President Napolitano intervened to point out that Mr Brancher was not entitled to claim “a legitimate impediment” in relation to the Milan trial because, as a minister without portfolio, he could not plausibly claim to be weighed down with time-consuming organisational responsibilities.
In response to the president’s intervention, Mr Brancher then announced that he would renounce his ministerial privilege and attend court hearings.
When he arrived in court yesterday morning, Mr Brancher asked to be allowed to make a “spontaneous” statement to the court.
Saying that he was in court to prove his innocence of any wrongdoing, Mr Brancher added that he had renounced his ministerial privilege in order to put an end to the “speculation and manipulation” linked to his appointment.
The resignation did not come as a total surprise since many political commentators had argued it would be a strong probability in the wake of a meeting between Mr Brancher and Mr Berlusconi on Sunday.
In a statement yesterday, the prime minister gave his approval for the resignation, saying: “His willingness to avoid long drawn- out and unfair polemics shows once more that his only desire was to work exclusively for the good of the country.”
The Brancher resignation comes two months after that of industry minister Claudio Scajola, who resigned because of allegations of impropriety in the purchase of an apartment in Rome.
With the centre-right bitterly divided over the government’s controversial wire-tap legislation, this latest resignation is unlikely to calm troubled waters. The speaker of the lower house, Gianfranco Fini, a co-founder with Mr Berlusconi of the governing Freedom Party, has recently expressed reservations about the bill, arguing that it may impede police investigations into organised crime.