Berlusconi facing sex and power abuse charges, will be tried by female judges

Posted Wednesday, February 16, 2011 by Montrealgazette.com

Berlusconi facing sex and power abuse charges, will be tried by female judges
LtoR Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi and Karima El Mahroug, aka Ruby, January 2011.

The sex charge against Berlusconi, who according to ex-wife Veronica Lario has a "sick" interest in "hanging out with underage girls," carries a maximum term of three years in jail.

The abuse of power can land a politician in jail for a dozen years.

"It's the biggest threat to his political career," said Queen's University political scientist Grant Amyot, co-author of the book The End of the Berlusconi Era?

Berlusconi has been tried on numerous occasions in the past on charges ranging from tax fraud and embezzlement to false accounting and attempted bribery of a judge.

But he has always ultimately avoided conviction, sometimes by getting his party to pass laws to delay the proceedings or suspend the trials.

But Amyot said that kind of tactic is unlikely given that his trial is set to begin in early April.

A conviction itself is unlikely to remove the prime minister from office, analysts say, because the appeals process could mean the case drags on for years.

But a tawdry trial, his waning popularity among women, and the impression that the government is distracted from major issues could chip away at his support in an election expected this year.

"It's going to bring out a lot of dirt about his private life," Walston told Postmedia News.

Berlusconi, described by a U.S. diplomat in WikiLeaks documents as "feckless, vain and ineffective," directly or indirectly controls five of the seven major TV channels.

He also owns a number of print media publications, and is using them to allege that he is a victim of a conspiracy by the judiciary and his leftist opponents.

While analysts don't rule out the possibility Berlusconi could survive the latest challenge, his fight isn't likely to help his country's international reputation.

The United Nations ranks Italy as the 23rd most developed country in the world in terms of health, education, living standards and income.

But the World Economic Forum's gender gap index puts Italy at a dismal 74th place, while Transparency International's Corruption Perceptions Index places Italy in 67th place. Reporters Without Borders has Italy in 49th place in terms of press freedom.

In all three rankings Italy is in the company of impoverished Third World countries and former eastern European communist dictatorships.

Walston said the TV shows on Berlusconi's networks are famous for featuring scantily-clad, wiggling young women who act as voiceless props.

His cabinet, dominated by older men, includes five women between the ages of 33 and 43. One of them, former topless model and showgirl Mara Carfagna, is minister for equal opportunities.

All are attractive, according to Walston, and three had "very close personal connections" with the prime minister.

Walston, who has lived in Italy since 1974, says Italy's toleration of Berlusconi is rooted in the influence of the Catholic Church, and the belief that all sorts of moral and criminal failings can be forgiven.

There is also a prevailing attitude among many men that Berlusconi is "doing what I'm doing, or would like to do," he said.

"If, as is likely, there are elections in Italy in the next couple of months or so, there is a fair possibility that he could win because the opposition is so divided," he told Postmedia News. "It's getting less and less likely, but it's not impossible."

Until Sunday's mass demonstration many women had accepted Berlusconi's indiscretions and the allegations of corruption, including the unproven charge he has links to the Mafia, according to Walston.

"That is changing. The demonstration shows Italian women are getting fed up. Whether it's enough to unseat him, I don't know."

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