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Giorgio Napolitano, 87, starts his second mandate as president of the Italian Republic on April 22, an unprecedented achievement in the country’s history.
Napolitano was elected on April 20 with the votes of the Democratic Party (PD), Silvio Berlusconi’s People of Freedom Party and Mario Monti’s Civic Choice. Despite having earlier ruled out the possibility of a second term, Napolitano changed his mind after Franco Marini and Romano Prodi failed to get elected due to a dramatic split in the PD that prompted its head, Pier Luigi Bersani, and the party’s entire leadership to resign.
The “new” president’s first act should be to approve the formation of a unity government and break a two-month political deadlock, writes the daily. This could see 75-year-old PD member Giuliano Amato, who led a short-lived emergency government in 1992-93, take over as head of the new unity government.
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