Italy's centre-left opposition sang victory on Wednesday after several snap polls said leader Romano Prodi had the edge over Premier Silvio Berlusconi in a much-hyped TV debate.
Almost 17 million Italians tuned in to watch the first 90-minute head-to-head between the two longstanding rivals who will face off in a general election on April 9. There will be a second debate on April 3.
According to four polls carried out immediately after the broadcast, Prodi won on points although he failed to deliver a decisive blow to his opponent, who is normally seen as the more persuasive on television. "Prodi was fresher, more convincing," enthused Piero Fassino, leader of the Democratic Left party. "Berlusconi was having such problems that by the end he was looking at the wrong camera."
Most newspapers agreed. "Prodi came out of it better," wrote Corriere della Sera in an editorial, arguing that the premier had appeared to suffer from the tight time limits on answers.
Berlusconi dismissed the polls that saw him as a loser, hinting they had a left-wing bias. "I think the result was quite the opposite," he said.
Communications Minister Mario Landolfi stuck by the premier, saying: "Berlusconi was more concrete and precise, only ceding ground at the end. He definitely won on points". The tightly controlled debate, in which the politicians had to answer questions in two and a half minutes, dominated conversation in bars and offices, even at the expense of the latest Italian victory in European soccer action.
But it made no impact on the odds offered by international betting agencies on the two candidates. Prodi remained the clear favourite, but the odds did not shorten. Even some analysts on the Left were cautious about the impact of the television encounter.
"Prodi certainly made more of an impact but it won't shift a single vote," said Marco Marturano, spin doctor for the Democratic Left (DS) party and Rome's mayor Walter Veltroni. In most surveys of Italians' voting intentions, the opposition leader has an advantage of about 4% over Berlusconi. However, one study found this week that 24% of voters are still undecided.
Berlusconi dismissed suggestions that he had struggled under the rules of the debate. "Rubbish, lies, just like everything I heard from him (Prodi) last night," he told reporters. Before the debate, the premier railed against the rules demanded by Prodi saying they would create a "waxwork museum" atmosphere. At the end of the TV debate he attacked them again.
"It seems to me we have not succeeded, at least as far as I am concerned, in giving Italians what they wanted to know," he said, in what many saw as an admission of defeat. Prodi, on the other hand, exuded contentment when he was questioned by reporters on the morning after the debate, especially when he heard how many people had watched.
"They were finally able to hear a calm conversation, in which candidates had time to express themselves, the way they do in civilised countries," he said. When it was pointed out that some observers, including two top US dailies, had criticised the debate as boring, he replied: "We're not ballerinas. We went to talk about the country's problems."
Boring or not, the event won the approval of the Vatican daily, the Osservatore Romano, which welcomed the absence of shouting and interruptions, a frequent feature political discussions on Italian TV.
"Finally, a contest which was tense but still dignified and without prevarication!" it said.
Of the four polls taken immediately after the head-to-head, one by the SWG agency gave Prodi the biggest advantage. Some 42.6% of its respondents said he won, against 35.6% who gave victory to Berlusconi.
Meanwhile, a Piepoli poll said 38% of viewers thought Prodi had won the encounter against 35 percent for Berlusconi. A survey in the left-leaning La Repubblica daily gave victory to Prodi by 50 percent to 44 percent.
