Italian left takes heart from Spanish, French vote

Walter Veltroni said in an interview published on Monday that the Spanish and French votes and Barack Obama's strong showing in U.S. Democratic primaries showed a centre left in ascendance. "A new wind is blowing in Europe and the West," Rome's mayor told La Repubblica daily after Spain's Socialists kept power in a national election on Sunday and the French left made gains on President Nicolas Sarkozy's centre right in municipal elections.

Veltroni, two decades younger than 71-year-old Berlusconi who is seeking a third term as prime minister, projects himself as an agent of change and renewal and compares himself to Obama. Asked what lessons he drew from Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero's victory in Spain, Veltroni said: "To be realistic and innovative and have the healthy radicalism to carry out the reforms that are needed." Berlusconi's opposition to talks to sell loss-making airline Alitalia to Air France-KLM for reasons of nationalism showed the right was "statist and anti-modern", said Veltroni, a former communist who now champions moderate reform.

Italy returns to the ballot box after two years in mid-April because centre-left Prime Minister Romano Prodi had to resign in January after defections from his unstable coalition. Veltroni was his anointed heir as leader of the Democratic Party (PD).

The latest polls suggest Veltroni has narrowed Berlusconi's initial 10-12 point advantage in the lower house of parliament to 6-7 points, but is having trouble reducing it further. In the upper house or Senate the difference is narrower and could produce a dead heat, which would force the winner to seek coalition partners or form a "Grand Coalition" between major parties on the right and left. Berlusconi and Veltroni both want to reform electoral law to put an end to coalitions relying on scores of tiny parties and move Italy closer towards a more stable two-party system. Leading centre-leftist Sergio Cofferati, Bologna mayor, told one paper that Spain's advantage over Italy was its "simpler" political system of "two well-defined parties".

Italy's hard left, which proved a difficult ally for Prodi, was spurned by Veltroni and is running as the "Rainbow Left", said it was closer to Spain's victorious Socialists than the PD. "Zapatero, with his innovative platform on rights, young people and energy policy, is much closer to the Rainbow Left than the PD, which is more like Sarkozy," said Italian Green leader Alfonso Pecoraro Scanio, Prodi's environment minister.

SARKOZY ALLIES TRY TO LIMIT VOTE DAMAGE

President Nicolas Sarkozy's centre-right UMP party suffered losses in the first round of French municipal elections on Sunday but avoided the crushing defeat some had predicted. Results showed the Socialists had convincingly kept control of France's second city Lyon and looked sure to maintain a firm grip on the capital Paris after the March 16 runoff ballot. The first round was branded "Warning" by Le Parisien daily but with much still to play for in a host of cities, leftist leaders urged their supporters to turn out in force next weekend and transform initial gains into ballot triumphs.

The municipal vote is the first major electoral test for Sarkozy since he stormed to power 10 months ago, and comes at a time when his own approval ratings have slumped. Although he was elected on a pledge to reform the economy, many voters feel he has not protected them from the rising cost of living and feel he has focused too much on his private life, marrying pop star Carla Bruni after a whirlwind romance.

At a national level, leftist parties won 47.94 percent of Sunday's vote and centre-right parties took 45.49 percent, with turnout relatively high at around 65 percent -- not the landslide predicted by some commentators before the first round. The key battlegrounds on March 16 will be the southern cities Marseille and Toulouse and, in the east, Strasbourg. All are controlled by the right but could fall to the Socialists. Both the right and the left face a week of negotiations to try to stitch up local deals, with the centrist Democratic Movement party (MODEM) often holding the balance of power.

The municipal ballot holds a special place in France because many national politicians seek election in the hope of building local power bases for themselves.