Anti-Islamic prankster set to be Berlusconi's deputy

A former dentist notorious for his anti-Islamic pranks is tipped to become Silvio Berlusconi's deputy prime minister. Roberto Calderoli is a senior member of the Northern League, the party whose success in grabbing 8 per cent of the vote was the sensation of last week's general election.

Mr Calderoli, who was the minister for reforms in Mr Berlusconi's last government, startled Italians two years ago, at the height of the uproar over "blasphemous" Danish cartoons, by ripping off his shirt on live television, revealing a T-shirt printed with one of the drawings. Last September he registered his objections to plans to build a new mosque by organising a "pig day" to antagonise Muslim sentiment, pigs being considered unclean by observant Muslims.

As reforms minister, he drafted a new electoral law which returns senators on a regional rather than national basis, opening the possibility that the two houses could be won by different parties. He later admitted that the law was a porcata, a "load of rubbish".

Mr Calderoli was one of a clutch of Northern League leaders who will attain high office, according to the party's founder, Umberto Bossi. He himself would be minister for reforms, he said. "Reform, security and the defence of agriculture, these are the points on which the people have given us their votes," Mr Bossi stressed.

Mr Berlusconi denied yesterday that he had taken firm decisions about his ministers. "Nothing has yet been decided," he said.