In 2008, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s center-right government passed a law that insured him immunity from prosecution while in office. Two months ago, in early October, Italy’s highest court ruled that the 2008 law was unconstitutional and as a result, two trials that consider allegations of false accounting and bribery against the prime minister have been reopened. Since the declaration of unconstitutionality, Berlusconi has reacted by accusing various parties of holding “leftist” biases against him, including Italy’s president Giorgio Napoletano, the foreign and national press, and left-leaning judges, and by inducing his government to introduce legislation that would annul the premier’s ongoing trials by means of a shortened statute of limitations.
Not surprisingly, those Italians who are not fans of their current prime minister have reacted with outrage to this fall’s events and have launched a national protest against him. That protest–up to this point largely an online movement–was made manifest in the Eternal City today when crowds clad in purple (a color they say represents vital energy and determination) took to the streets on NBD or No Berlusconi Day. Protests were also held in such cities as Buenos Aires, San Francisco, Sacramento, Ottawa, Montreal, London, Madrid, Vienna, and Istanbul.
Widely discussed in print and on websites, the protest attracted tens of thousands of people who marched from Piazza della Repubblica to San Giovanni in Laterano before being treated to a concert in which dozens of musicians participated.
