Italian business faces uneasy choice at election

MILAN, Mar 30 (Reuters) Italian business should be spoilt for choice when considering the two candidates for prime minister at April elections: the country's richest man and a former president of the European Commission.

But far from it -- neither contestant in elections on April 9-10 has so far put forward the policies business wants to kick start a stagnant economy and rein in a bulging state deficit.

After five years in power, entrepreneur Silvio Berlusconi's centre-right coalition is promising labour and corporate tax cuts as well as spending curbs to rein in the deficit -- but provides little detail of how this will happen.

Spending has actually increased by 2 percentage points of gross domestic product (GDP) under Berlusconi's government.

The opposition centre-left under former Commission head Romano Prodi -- around 4 points ahead in opinion polls -- is offering a similar miracle cure, but is equally short on detail on spending cuts.

Luca di Montezemolo, head of the Confindustria employers' association, has called the campaign ''a carnival of populism''.

Business leaders are sceptical either side can actually deliver on its promises.

''Business feels let down,'' Bruno Magnani, chief executive of software firm Finetwork, told Reuters earlier this month.

''At the beginning (of Berlusconi's mandate) he promised to develop Italy. But we've had five years of stagnation without any prospects for the future.'' Paolo Barilla of the Barilla Group food firm said business had to rely on its own capabilities.

''It's not that changing the government will change the situation. It's not a question of right or left, it's up to business itself,'' he said at an event in Parma last week.

Confindustria has called for a raft of measures including cuts in energy costs, tax credits for research spending and other fiscal benefits as well as more market liberalisation.

While tax cuts are offered by both sides, neither is clear about how these will be funded.

FRUSTRATING BUREAUCRACY Berlusconi, whose family controls Italian television network Mediaset , holding company Fininvest and soccer team AC Milan, is a self-made billionaire whose natural hinterland should be Italy's millions of small-scale entrepreneurs.

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