Arnaldo Forlani

This article is about the Italian legislator. For the similar name used as an alias by terrorist Ramzi Yousef for Philippine Airlines Flight 434, see Ramzi Yousef.

Arnaldo Forlani
43rd Prime Minister of Italy
In office 18 October 1980 – 28 June 1981
President	Alessandro Pertini
Preceded by	Francesco Cossiga
Succeeded by	Giovanni Spadolini
Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs
In office 29 July 1976 – 4 August 1979
Prime Minister	Giulio Andreotti
Preceded by	Mariano Rumor
Succeeded by	Franco Maria Malfatti
Personal details
Born	8 December 1925 Pesaro, The Marches, Italy
Nationality	Italian
Political party	Christian Democracy

Arnaldo Forlani (Italian pronunciation: [arˈnaldo forˈlaːni]; born 8 December 1925) is an Italian politician who served as the 43rd Prime Minister of Italy from 18 October 1980 to 28 June 1981.^[1] He was previously a member of the right-wing of the Italian Christian Democratic Party.^[2]

Biography

Forlani was born in Pesaro, Marche.

After the degree in law, Forlani began his career as politician in 1948, holding the position of provincial leader of Italian Christian Democratic Party in Pesaro and Urbino. In 1954 he became a member of the central directive of DC.

He was first elected to the chamber of deputies in 1958 and served as foreign minister from 1976 to 1979. In 1969 he had been elected as president of DC.

As prime minister he had to deal with corruption scandals within his party, an earthquake in southern Italy and a renewed bout of left-wing terrorism. He was known as an unflamboyant politician who attempted to stay out of the factionalism in his party. During his presidency, the list of who belonged to the secret lodge P2 was published. However, the lateness with which they were published gained Forlani heavy criticism (in particular from the Italian Communist Party). He was therefore compelled to resign from the position, staying away from spotlight of politics for a certain period. With his resignation, the unbroken line since 1945 of DC Prime Ministers came to an end.

In the two governments led by Bettino Craxi (of Partito Socialista Italiano) in the 1980s, Forlani was the Vice Prime Minister. Italian historians of the period have suggested that Craxi, Forlani and Giulio Andreotti had signed a secret pact to control the politics of Italy: from the initials of their surnames, this pact was named CAF.^[3][4][5]

In 1992, Forlani was a candidate for President of Italy. However, he did not get elected.

During the Tangentopoli scandal, Forlani was charged of having received illegal funds, and subsequently retired from public politics.

His former spokesman, Pier Ferdinando Casini, is considered Forlani's politics direct heir.

References

1. 1981: Italy in crisis as cabinet resigns BBC.co.uk accessed 23 January 2008
3. examples of the common use of the acronym CAF to refer to the Craxi-Andreotti-Forlani political axis
4. more examples
5. other examples