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ROME, March 12: Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, facing parliamentary elections next month, stormed out of a television studio on Sunday when pressed in an interview about his relations with US President George Bush and conflicts of interest.
“This channel is a war machine set against the prime minister,” Italy’s media tycoon shouted, before gathering up his papers and marching out of the studio.
“Goodbye madam. If you won’t let me answer the question, I’m getting up and I’m off.”
Mr Berlusconi, who controls Italy’s largest private broadcaster, has banked on his media appearances helping him to win elections next month.
But he had not factored in Lucia Annunziata, a former head of state broadcaster RAI and long-standing foe, employing a confrontational interview style familiar in Britain and the United States but rarely seen in Italy.
Ms Annunziata, an opposition supporter, challenged Mr Berlusconi on the RAI 3 programme to explain why to people outside Italy he was known only for his support of President Bush on Iraq and for the conflict between his business and political interests.
Mr Berlusconi, visibly irritated, refused to discuss his relationship with Mr Bush further.
His support for the Iraq invasion is unpopular with most Italians and he has played it down during campaigning.
EQUAL SPACE: After failing to get a word in about his government’s achievements, he accused Annunziata of being biased towards the left and said the left had occupied state television.
Berlusconi staged a broadcasting blitz at the start of the year, appearing on television and radio shows almost every day for five weeks to spread his feel-good message.
Strict campaigning laws have since swung into place, forcing the media to give equal space to Italy’s many political parties, squeezing Berlusconi’s air time.
Cracks have started to show in his usually buoyant television style, before he faces opposition leader Romano Prodi on Tuesday in a U.S.-style television showdown on RAI.
“You are not used to taking journalists’ questions, this is my show, I’ll decide what questions I ask,” snapped Annunziata, who quit her RAI job two years ago claiming it had become just a ‘mail box’ for requests from the government.—Reuters
