[Infowarrior] - Italian news media on strike

[Richard Forno]

Silvio Berlusconi's 'gag law' sparks media strike in Italy

Embattled prime minister hopes to pass privacy bill but editors and judges say he wants to hide from scandal

	• John Hooper in Rome
	• The Guardian,	 Friday 9 July 2010
	• Article history

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/jul/09/silvio-berlusconi-media-gag-law

‘The gagging law denies citizens the right to be informed’ … a front page in June condemns Silvio Berlusconi's bill.
There will be no news in Italy today; or, at least, hardly any. That is not a prediction, but fact: none of the main newspapers are appearing because their reporters and editors are on a 24-hour strike. Today they are due to be joined by radio, TV and some internet journalists.

The action is over a parliamentary bill proposing a law that Silvio Berlusconi's government claims safeguards privacy. Most of Italy's editors, judges and prosecutors say it is intended to shield politicians, and particularly the prime minister, whose career has been ridden with financial and sexual scandals.

The so-called "gagging law" would curb the ability of police and prosecutors to record phone conversations and plant listening devices. It would also stop journalists publishing the resulting transcripts. Investigators seeking to listen in on a suspect would need permission from three judges. Regardless of circumstances, eavesdropping warrants would expire after 75 days, after which they must be renewed every three days.

The National Magistrates' Association said it had very serious consequences: "The fight against crime will be much more difficult for police and investigating magistrates, while the administration of justice will be overwhelmed by bureaucratic demands that will make the operation of the system objectively impossible."

The bill excludes mafia and terrorism investigations. But the police unions say it would cripple inquiries into offences such as moneylending and drug-trafficking which frequently lead investigators to organised criminals and terrorists.

The media would only be able to publish a summary of the findings of an investigation after it had ended. While that may be no more onerous a restriction than applies in Britain, the editor of Italy's biggest-selling daily, Corriere della Sera, Ferruccio de Bortoli, argues it is "a bill tailor-made to shield members of the government from unwelcome investigation".

He added: "If this were a normal country, and there were not these interested attempts to make the work of the prosecutors more difficult, we would be readier to countenance a measure to protect the privacy of individuals."

Last year Berlusconi, aged 73, was severely embarrassed when leaks from an inquiry into corruption in the health sector revealed his private life, including parties at his Roman palazzo at which women outnumbered men by four to one. Some were prostitutes. One handed prosecutors recordings she made, allegedly of the prime minister's pillow talk, which ended up on the internet.

In May Berlusconi was given a further reminder of the power of the press and the prosecution service when he reluctantly said goodbye to his industry minister, Claudio Scajola, who was reported to have been involved in a shady property deal. But recent weeks have shown the bill to be double-edged.

Opposition to it has offered a cause to dissidents within Berlusconi's Freedom People (PdL) movement, dissidents led by Gianfranco Fini, the governing party's co-founder. This week, Fini, a former neo-fascist who now presents himself as a standard bearer of enlightened, Cameronian conservatism, declared there was "never enough press freedom in a great democratic nation".

The gagging law is to enter the last stage of its parliamentary journey on July 29. There is speculation that, unless a compromise can be reached, the final vote could split the PdL. Fini does not have enough supporters to rob the prime minister of his majority, but if they began even to abstain they would condemn Berlusconi to a legislative nightmare of endless, razor-edge votes in parliament.

Before the end of the month, however, the increasingly embattled prime minister faces another challenge, in securing approval for an emergency budget his government says is needed to save Italy going the way of Greece. It aims to narrow Italy's widening budget deficit by almost €25bn over the next two years, mainly through spending cuts the government has deftly passed on to local authorities.

This week Berlusconi called a confidence vote to force the measure through parliament. But, as he told a television interviewer yesterday, that means: "If we don't win, we go home." He would be constitutionally bound to resign if he lost.That looks unlikely. The PdL has a majority of 60 in the 630-seat lower house and one of more than 30 in the 315-seat senate.

But as the likely impact of the cuts, particularly on health and welfare services, have become daily more apparent, Berlusconi's popularity has tumbled. A poll in Corriere della Sera yesterday showed his approval rating at 41% — down nine percentage points in six weeks.

It found that 57% of those interviewed had a negative opinion of his ability to govern, compared with 48% at the end of May. Most worryingly of all for the government, the poll registered a seven percentage points drop in Berlusconi's popularity among his own voters.

Another factor is his handling of a scandal given wide publicity. Last month he created a place in his cabinet for one Aldo Brancher. Like so many Berlusconi followers, the new minister for decentralisation and subsidiarity had once been an executive in his business empire, where he was remanded on charges of illegally funding the Socialist party, whose leader was Berlusconi's most prominent sponsor.

Though found guilty at trial and appeal, Brancher was saved at the highest level of the judicial system by technicalities. Now he is back on trial, charged this time with embezzlement.

Opposition politicians claimed he was given a seat in the cabinet purely so to take advantage of a law passed in March enabling ministers to block trials while in office by first insisting on their right to appear in court and then crying off, using official duties as the reason.

Five days after being sworn in, Brancher duly invoked the "law of legitimate impediment", sparking outraged criticism that forced the prime minister into a U-turn. Last week he told his colleague that he would have to go, and on Monday Brancher  announced his resignation – appropriately enough, in the court where he is being tried.

The affair demonstrated there are limits to Berlusconi's power. But it highlighted another point. At the origin of Brancher's indictment was a bank scandal which began in 2005 when transcripts were published of conversations involving the then governor of the Bank of Italy.

The public might have known nothing had the gagging law proposed to safeguard privacy then been in force.

Courtroom notoriety


December 1997 Medusa Cinema case: Berlusconi sentenced to 16 months in jail for false accounting of 10bn lire. Appealed and acquitted.

May 2000 Milan court overturns a bribery conviction. Found guilty on four counts and sentenced to two years and nine months in jail. However, the statute of limitations expired for three of the charges. Acquitted on the fourth on appeal.

June 2001 A court of appeal upholds the acquittal on bribery charges in connection with his acquisition of the Mondadori publishing house, but ordered his one-time attorney Cesare Previti and three others to stand trial again.

October 2001 Celebrates acquittal on bribery charges with a letter to the Corriere della Sera newspaper in which he hails the verdict as a defeat for "politicised magistrates".

July 2003 Compares German MEP to a concentration camp guard.

February 2009 British tax lawyer David Mills sentenced to 4½ years over illegal payments for Berlusconi. Sentence quashed in February 2010.

June 2009 Three women claim they were paid to attend parties at Berlusconi's official Rome residence. One releases tapes of encounters.

July 2010 Berlusconi introduces a law limiting the use of wiretaps by police.