Watershed Poll to Redraw Italy's Political Map

ROME -- Italy heads this weekend into national elections marked by scandal, uncertainty and unlikely alliances, all punctuated by tumult enough for a temperamental diva.


But none of the tempest should obscure the significance of the balloting Sunday and Monday:


The election marks a traumatic search for political rebirth in a rich but leaderless country disgusted with its corrupt democracy.


A radically retextured political fabric has divided into forces of the left, center and right, all gathering for a high-stakes leap into an unclear future.


"People are fed up; the political system has collapsed. If we can't restore legality and legitimacy to government, democracy itself is at risk," said Maria Luisa Boccia, a first-time candidate who is running under a leftist alliance.


Chief among the debuting candidates is self-professed anticommunist crusader Silvio Berlusconi, one of the country's richest men and -- suddenly -- Italy's most popular politician.


He portrays himself as the one figure who could short-circuit chances of a leftist victory. The collapse of international communism had made Italy's left less threatening, and the subsequent decimation by scandal of its domestic opponents had elevated it to the position of clear election favorite until Berlusconi jumped into the race.


Five former prime ministers, several ministers, numerous parliamentarians and some of the country's most prominent industrialists have all been scarred by a two-year investigation that has documented official corruption.


More than 3,000 in all have been touched by the probe, which has uncovered millions of dollars of theft and illegal payments to politicians of virtually every party in every part of the country.


Now, seeking a break with the past, Italy has fashioned a new electoral system, scrapping proportional, vote-for-parties rules that have produced 52 weak, look-alike coalition governments since World War II, all of them forged in smoke-filled rooms far from public gaze.


Under the reforms, Italians will vote for individual candidates for the first time. Three-quarters of 630 deputies and 315 senators will be elected in the winner-take-all, American-style election. Probably for the last time, the remaining seats will be distributed proportionally, allowing continued representation by sliver parties.


When a ban on further publication of poll results went into effect on March 12, Berlusconi's Forza Italia, the newest national political movement, was also its most popular.


The last sounding gave the right 43 percent (26 percent for Forza Italia); the left 38 percent (20 percent for the former Communists), and the center the remaining 19 percent.


Berlusconi has acquired two electoral rightist allies: Umberto Bossi, the bumptious head of the populist-federalist Northern League (7 percent) and Gianfranco Fini, polished boss of the neo-fascist MSI, newly renamed the National Alliance (10 percent).


The rightist parties have agreed on common candidates in most districts. But candidates are answerable to their own parties, and the prospect of effective governmental collaboration among the three movements is dim.


For their part, the former Communists have forged an eight-party Progressive Alliance that includes Greens, an anti-Mafia party, leftist Catholics and -- embarrassingly -- a hard-line splinter of the old Communist Party backed by about one voter in 20.


Called Refounded Communism, it is still loudly Marxist in its rhetoric and program -- and profoundly discomfiting to the former Communist and would-be statesman Achille Occhetto, who dreams of a place in government for his party after almost 50 years in opposition.