The head of a small political party withdrew from Italy's general election race on Thursday, averting the threat of an embarrassing poll postponement.
Giuseppe Pizza of the centrist Christian Democrat party (DC) said he would renounce his right to run in the April 13-14 elections so that the ballot could proceed as planned.
''I belong to a party which has always shown a sense of State,'' said Pizza, who was initially banned from standing in a wrangle over his party's symbol.
The problem of an election postponement surfaced on Tuesday when a top Italian court upheld Pizza's right to take part.
The Council of State's decision threw the political world into a spin, with Interior Minister Giuliano Amato warning that the elections might have to be postponed because all parties were lawfully entitled to a 30-day period of campaigning.
The Interior Ministry then said it was moving to have the court's decision overturned on the grounds that the election process was already under way and would take the case up with the Supreme Court.
The main election contenders, former premier Silvio Berlusconi and ex-Rome mayor Walter Veltroni, both stressed they were firmly against any poll delay.
Centre-right chief Berlusconi, who is bidding for his third term as premier, said on Thursday that ''the last thing Italy needs at the moment is to be seen by the international community as a country forced to postpone its elections''.
Berlusconi's centre-right People of Freedom (PDL) coalition is several points ahead of Veltroni's centre-left Democratic Party (PD) in the opinion polls.
Talking to reporters about his decision to withdraw from the elections, Pizza said that he had been worried about a violation of the Constitution if the elections were postponed.
Under the Constitution, a general election must be held within 70 days of parliament's dissolution, and hence on the 16th of this month at the latest.
Pizza said he would nonetheless carry out some ''symbolic'' campaigning over the next two weeks.
The DC had originally been barred from running by the Interior Ministry because its logo was similar to that of a larger centrist rival, the UDC.
Both logos display the so-called Scudo Crociato, a red cross bearing the Latin word Libertas (Freedom) enclosed within a shield, which is a cherished symbol for all centrist, Catholic parties who regard themselves as heirs to the once-dominant Christian Democrat party.
