Anti-euro mood in Italy clouds Napolitano departure
By James Mackenzie
ROME, Jan 14 (Reuters) - For Italy's partners in Brussels and Washington, President Giorgio Napolitano was a guarantor of stability during the euro zone crisis. But for austerity-weary Italians turning increasingly against Europe, his image is more ambivalent.
U.S. President Barack Obama last week thanked Napolitano, who resigned on Wednesday, for his "historic" term in office. The 89-year-old former communist has also been praised by international investors and commentators, who contrast his dutiful stance with Italy's fractious politicians.
At home, political tributes flowed and Italy's main industry association Confindustria thanked "a true servant of the state".
But in a country where almost half the electorate say they will vote for Eurosceptic or anti-euro parties, praise from business lobbies and foreign leaders can be double-edged.
"There's the point of view of those who have a stake in Italy keeping its accounts in order and not creating tensions on the markets, but that's not necessarily the perspective of everyone in Italy," said Lorenzo De Sio, a political scientist at Rome's LUISS university.
While #GraziePresidente was trending on Twitter there were many sarcastic comments among the tributes.
Napolitano was instrumental in managing the debt crisis of 2011, when bond markets turned on Silvio Berlusconi's scandal-hit government and Italy risked a financial disaster that could have forced it out of the euro.
But as economic agony has deepened and hostility to euro zone policy has grown, many place Napolitano within a failed elite that has handed sovereignty to financial markets, the European Central Bank and Berlin.
Berlusconi's fall and the appointment of technocrat premier Mario Monti created a stalemate during which anti-system parties such as Beppe Grillo's 5-Star Movement have flourished.
Three successive cross-party governments have held power without winning an election, each struggling to pass reforms while Italy declines. Many blame the head of state.
In the mouths of supporters, Napolitano's nickname "King George" has a reassuring ring. But it has more sinister overtones when used by critics who charge him with riding roughshod over parliament and violating the constitution to ensure the mainstream parties retained power.
"Napolitano shouldn't resign, he should hand himself over to the police," Grillo told foreign journalists in Rome last month.
While that remains a minority view, and the president is more popular than most Italian politicians, his approval ratings have dropped from 60 percent when he began his second term in 2013 to 39 percent last week. (Reporting by James Mackenzie; Editing by Catherine Evans)
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