Protest for press freedom targets Berlusconi

The Italian Press Federation, opposition groups and left-wing trade unionists gathered yesterday for a protest for press freedom, charging that scandal-plagued Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi wanted to muzzle the media.

The prime minister-cum-media tycoon has filed a series of lawsuits against newspapers in Italy, France and Spain after months of revelations about his private life, and his supporters have called on Italians to stop paying their public television viewing fees.

"On Rai (public TV), it's anti-Berlusconism seven days a week," fumed Il Giornale, a newspaper belonging to the Berlusconi family's media empire Mediaset, which also owns three private TV stations. The government has de facto control over Rai.

Such accusations have appeared regularly in the pro-government media for months, but have spiked since Rai 2 twice invited to its studios a call girl who claims to have accepted money to spend the night with the prime minister.

Calling on Italians to withhold their annual viewing fees, Il Giornale said their money would only be used to pay call girls to appear on Rai's Annozero programme.

The paper said it received some 11,000 letters of support.

The government threatened to eliminate Annozero, which claimed an audience of seven million, or 29 per cent of the viewing public, the second time call girl Patrizia D'Addario appeared on the show last Thursday.

The government has also suspended the contracts of the journalists who work for Annozero.

Last Friday, the head of the press freedom watchdog Re-porters Without Borders, Jean-François Julliard, said Berlusconi was on the way towards becoming the first European head of government to join the group's "list of predators of freedom of the press".

Recalling Berlusconi's urging of businesses not to advertise in the left-leaning La Repubblica daily, Julliard told a news conference: "We know of similar cases only in Belarus and Zimbabwe."

Berlusconi dismissed yesterday's planned protest as a "farce", saying "Freedom is greater in Italy than in any other Western country".

Daniele Capezzone, spokes-man for Berlusconi's centre-right People of Freedom party, said yesterday: "If they had a little intellectual honesty, (the organisers) would admit that theirs is an anti-government demonstration. They are not objective journalists but sectarian political activists."

Enrico Mentana, a former star Mediaset journalist who quit after an editorial dispute, suggested that freedom of the press in Italy did not face a greater threat than before.

"Here you can read either that Berlusconi is a god or an imbecile, a saint or a confirmed delinquent," he said.

"Each time, it's double vision, but with a flagrant imbalance in favour of the prime minister, who by the way is a reflection of political life with an extremely weakened left," Mentana said.

In fact, while Berlusconi is a favourite target on the few satirical or political debate programes on Rai 2 and Rai 3, he enjoys fawning admiration from Rai 1, which is traditionally close to the government.

"Happy birthday! You are at home here," Rai 1's news announcer said without an ounce of irony last Tuesday, when Berlusconi turned 73.

The station accorded the prime minister two hours recently during which he defended his policies without interruption.

Some wonder why he would want to cripple public stations that could be useful to him.

Fabio Fazio, host of political programme Che Tempo Fa, noted that without income from fees the public stations would have to turn to advertisers - drawing income away from Mediaset.

From January to July 2009 the group raked in €2.58 billion in advertising revenue, according to the marketing and media information firm Nielsen.