Italian prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right coalition risks losing its northern power base of Milan to the left for the first time in nearly 20 years when voting in local elections ends today.
Some 6 million Italians are eligible to vote in mayoral contests in 90 towns and six provinces, but the focus is squarely on the main battlegrounds in the financial capital Milan and the southern port of Naples.
Voting began at 7am and results expected after the polls close after lunch.
With the government preparing to bring forward plans to slash the budget deficit by some €40 billion after ratings agency Standard and Poor's cut its outlook for Italy's A+ rating to "negative" from "stable", the stakes are high.
Defeat in his hometown of Milan would be a serious blow for a premier already weakened by a series of sex scandals, corruption trials and a sluggish economy and could call into question his government's ability to push through painful cuts.
Despite a mountainous public debt of about 120 per cent of gross domestic product, Italy has largely avoided the financial market turmoil seen in Greece or Portugal but the S&P warning earlier this month was a reminder of the price of inaction.
"This is the real dilemma. Will the current government be able to manage it?" business daily Il Sole 24 Ore asked in an editorial on today.
Berlusconi suffered a drubbing in the first round of voting on May 15th and 16th, when an uninspired centre left easily held on to power in Turin and Bologna and forced the centre right into run-offs in Naples and Milan.
A loss would almost certainly deepen a rift with his main ally, the Northern League, and could provoke challenges to his otherwise unquestioned leadership of the centre right.
Reuters