One man cannot be greater than a whole nation and power sure has limit.....nothing is forever.Former Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's jail sentence for tax fraud heralds the end of an era dominated by one man .
One anti-Berlusconi paper (LA Stampa) called a "natural-born delinquent". It further reads"The mirages and alibis are finished. An entire generation of Italians born after 1975 will for the first time vote in elections next spring that are not a pro- or anti-Berlusconi referendum."
Berlusconi, 76, had already announced last week he would not stand in next year's elections. Even though sentencing Friday to four years in jail was quickly reduced to one under an amnesty law designed to reduce overcrowding in prisons, this has put an emphatic end of his domination of the Italian political scene.
"And so ends a Titanic affair, born in television and finished in court, with a clear, very tough and above all insulting punishment," wrote the editor of the centre-left daily La Repubblica, Ezio Mauro, saying the case highlighted Berlusconi's fall from grace.
Il Fatto Quotidiano, which had waged war on Berlusconi's government during his three stints as prime minister between 1994 and 2011, said the media tycoon had a "natural capacity for delinquency".
The verdict "is the proof that Italy was governed for nine years by a tax cheat," said the paper.
During the trial, Berlusconi was accused of artificially inflating the price of distribution rights bought by his Mediaset empire and creating foreign slush funds to avoid paying taxes in Italy.
Scandal-hit Berlusconi condemned his sentence as "intolerable judicial harassment".
Berlusconi's lawyers have said they will appeal by
November 10.Italy's lengthy appeals process will likely ensure he never sees the inside of a jail cell but that does not change the fact that the wind of change is already blowing through Italy and seriously hoping such change blows all over Africa soonest.
No comments:
Post a Comment