ROME: Italy's chance of stable government after elections this weekend may rely on forcing two awkward partners into coalition: former European Commissioner Mario Monti and an openly gay leftist he has vowed not to work with.
The mutual sniping between Monti and Nichi Vendola, governor of the southern region of Puglia, has intensified during the final weeks of campaigning for elections on Sunday and Monday and both have declared their visions for Italy "incompatible".
Yet polls indicate the centre-left coalition, in which Vendola's Left Ecology Freedom (SEL) is the main partner allied to the larger Democratic Party (PD), may have to join forces with Monti's centrist group in order to rule.
Monti has called Vendola, whose defence of welfare and labour rights appeal to traditional left-wingers, an obstacle to much needed economic reforms and urged PD leader Pier Luigi Bersani, most likely head of the next government, to drop him.
With his bowl of silver hair and a sleepy expression, the 54-year-old Vendola, has been equally critical of Monti, who headed a government of technocrats to haul Italy back from economic collapse after Silvio Berlusconi quit power in 2011.
"Monti's year in government left the country wounded," Vendola told foreign reporters in Rome on Thursday.
"Austerity must be loosened to restore necessary oxygen to an economy that is out of breath."
Sporting a diamond-studded hoop earring, Vendola said Monti was "not the same" as centre-right leader Silvio Berlusconi but his social agenda was "unsuitable for younger generations".
Monti, a devout Catholic, said last month he was against gay marriage. Vendola, also a practising Catholic, has long campaigned for the right of same-sex couples to wed, so he can marry his boyfriend.
In Italy's socially conservative south, Vendola shocked even his own party by winning the governorship of Puglia the heel of the Italian boot in 2005.
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