Romano Prodi has said he is confident of forming a new Italian government despite allegations from his rival, Silvio Berlusconi, of widespread fraud in the recent general election. "There is nothing to worry about, we are serene," the centre-left leader, who won a razor-thin majority in the elections, was quoted as saying. Meanwhile Berlusconi, the incument prime minister, who initially demanded a recount of 43,000 contested votes after Prodi won, has called for a wider check of returns from all 60,000 polling stations, as well as more than one million votes deemed invalid. "The result must, and will, change because there has been endless vote rigging in different places, all over Italy," Berlusconi said late on Wednesday after visiting Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, the Italian president. "Did you think you'd got rid of me?" he asked reporters.
Responding to the call, Prodi accused the prime minister of delaying tactics and told supporters at a victory rally in his home city of Bologna that the media magnate politician should "go home".