‘Does Italy have a new opposition leader in Gianfranco Fini?’ asks Italian news blog L’Antefatto.

After yesterday’s televised comments, it would appear so.

Italy’s Speaker of the House and longstanding Silvio Berlusconi ally, Gianfranco Fini, was caught trashtalking about the Italian Prime Minister yesterday during an off-camera moment. Gianfranco Fini is one of the leaders of the National Alliance party, a reformed political continuation of the Fascist party.

While in conversation with a magistrate, Fini made a snippy comment about PM Berlusconi’s trouble with the law and disdain for Italy’s judicial system: ‘He confuses electoral consent with absolute monarchy… I told him that he cannot continue this way.’ Fini also declared allegations that Berlusconi had Mafia ties to be an ‘nuclear bomb’ for the Prime Minister’s reputation.

While L’Antefatto hypothesizes about the rise of a new opposition figure, Euronews writes that Fini has been called upon to explain his comments criticising the Italian prime minister. Meanwhile, Reuters reports that Fini telephoned a television show late on Tuesday to make it clear he believes “Berlusconi has nothing to do with the Mafia.”

But he refused to take back his comments about the prime minister’s autocratic style, saying Berlusconi “has the right to continue governing because he was given a wide popular mandate, but he must respect parliament and the judiciary bodies.”

Nonetheless, Berlusconi’s grasp of Italy’s national political scene appears to be slipping as a string of sex scandals and judicial proceedings involving the PM’s alleged ties with the Mafia have deteriorated his public standing. To many, Gianfranco Fini appears to be a likely successor.

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