A former professor of economics and international advisor toGoldman Sachs, Prodi ran as lead candidate ofThe Olive Tree coalition, winning the1996 election and serving as prime minister until losing a vote of confidence 1998. He was subsequently appointed President of the European Commission in 1999, serving until 2004. Following the victory of his new coalition,The Union, over theHouse of Freedoms led bySilvio Berlusconi, at the2006 election, Prodi became prime minister a second time. On 24 January 2008, he lost a vote of confidence in the Senate and consequently tendered his resignation as prime minister to PresidentGiorgio Napolitano; he continued in office for almost four months for routine business until early elections were held and a new government was formed. Prodi was the first left-leaning candidate to finish first in an Italian general election since1921.
In 2007, Prodi became the founding president of theDemocratic Party. In 2008, United Nations Secretary-GeneralBan Ki-moon selected Prodi as president of theAfrican Union–United Nations peacekeeping panel.[4] Since 2021, he is serving as the United NationsSpecial Envoy for theSahel.
Prodi was born inScandiano, nearReggio Emilia, in 1939; he is the eighth of nine children. His father, Mario Prodi, was an engineer who grew up in a peasant family, and his mother, Enrichetta, was an elementary school teacher. Most of the brothers are, or have been, university professors, among themGiovanni Prodi (professor of mathematical analysis),Vittorio Prodi (professor of physics andmember of the European Parliament),Paolo Prodi (professor of modern history),Franco Prodi [it] (professor of atmospheric physics), andGiorgio Prodi (professor of general pathology).[5]
In 1969, Prodi married Flavia Franzoni, at that time a student, who later became an economist and university professor. The couple was married byCamillo Ruini, now a well-knowncardinal.[6][7] They have two sons, Giorgio and Antonio. His wife, Flavia, died on 13 June 2023 at the age of 76.[8]
After completing his secondary education at theLiceo Ludovico Ariosto in Reggio Emilia, Prodi graduated in law atMilan'sUniversità Cattolica in 1961 with a thesis on the role ofprotectionism in the development of Italian industry. He then carried out postgraduate studies at theLondon School of Economics.[9]
Prodi has received almost 20 honorary degrees from institutions in Italy, and from the rest of Europe, North America, Asia, and Africa.[10]
On 25 November 1978, Prodi was appointedMinister of Industry, Commerce, and Crafts in the government of theChristian Democracy leaderGiulio Andreotti. Even if he was a party member, Prodi was widely considered a technical minister. As minister, he promoted a law, known as Prodi law, which aimed a regulating of the extraordinary state administration procedure for the rescue of large enterprises in crisis.[11]
On 2 April 1978, Prodi and other teachers at theUniversity of Bologna passed on a tip-off that revealed the whereabouts of thesafe house where the kidnappedAldo Moro, the former prime minister, was being held captive by theRed Brigades. Prodi stated that he had been given this tip-off by the founders of Christian Democracy, contacted from beyond the grave via aséance and aOuija board. Whilst during this supposed séance Prodi thoughtGradoli referred to a town on the outskirts of Rome, it probably referred to the Roman address of a Red Brigades safe house, located at no. 96, Via Gradoli.[12]
The information was trusted, and a police group made an armed blitz in the town of Gradoli, 80 km fromRome, on the following day, 6 April,[12] although Moro was not found. The supernatural element was generally not overlooked during the investigations. For example, the Italian government had engaged adiviner, hoping that he would find Moro's location.[13] The police made another fruitless blitz in Viterbo after an abbess declared that, during a vision, she had seen him there.[14]
Prodi spoke to theItalian Parliament's commission about the case in 1981. In the notes of the Italian Parliament commission on terrorism, the séance is described as a fake, used to hide the true source of the information.[15] In 1997, Andreotti declared that the information came from the Bologna section ofAutonomia Operaia, a far-left organization with some ties with the Red Brigades, and thatFrancesco Cossiga also knew the true source. JudgeFerdinando Imposimato considered Andreotti's theory as possible but accused him of having kept information that could have been valuable in a trial about Moro's murder.[16] Moro's widow later declared that she had repeatedly informed the police that a Via Gradoli existed in Rome, but the investigators did not consider it; some replied to her that the street did not appear in Rome's maps. This is confirmed by other Moro relatives but strongly denied by Cossiga, who served as Interior Minister during Moro's kidnapping.[17]
In the 1990s, the séance matter was reopened by the Italian Parliament's commission on terrorism. While Prodi (then Prime Minister) declared that he had no time for an interview, bothMario Baldassarri (senator and vice-minister in twoSilvio Berlusconi cabinets) andAlberto Clò (Minister of Industry inLamberto Dini's cabinet and owner of the house where the séance was performed) responded to the call; they confirmed the circumstances of the séance, and thatGradoli had appeared in several sessions, even if the participants had changed.[18] Later, other Italian members of theEuropean Commission alleged that Prodi had invented this story to conceal the real source of the tip-off, which they believed to have originated somewhere among the far-left Italian political groups.[18]
This issue came back again in 2005, when Prodi was accused of being "aKGB man" byMario Scaramella.[19] The allegations were rejected by Prodi. FormerFederal Security Service (FSB) officerAlexander Litvinenko also said that FSB deputy chiefAnatoly Trofimov "did not exactly say that Prodi was a KGB agent, because the KGB avoids using that word."[20] The same accusation was raised in 2002 by theMitrokhin Commission, which was closed in 2006 with a majority and a minority report, without reaching shared conclusions, and without any concrete evidence given to support the original allegations of KGB ties to Italian politicians contained in theMitrokhin Archive. Led by thecentre-right coalition majority, it was criticized as politically motivated, as it was focused mainly on allegations against opposition figures.[21] 2006 saw the publication of telephone interceptions between the chairman of the Mitrokhin Commission,Forza Italia senatorPaolo Guzzanti, and Scaramella. In the wiretaps, Guzzanti made it clear that the true intent of the Mitrokhin Commission was to support the hypothesis that Prodi would have been an agent financed or in any case manipulated by Moscow and the KGB.[22][23] According to the opposition, which submitted its own minority report, this hypothesis was false, and the purpose of the commission was therefore to discredit him.[24] In the wiretaps, Scaramella had the task of collecting testimonies from some ex-agents of the Soviet secret service refugees in Europe to support these accusations; he was later charged forcalumny.[25]
In November 2006, the new Italian Parliament with acentre-left coalition majority instituted a commission to investigate the Mitrokhin Commission for allegations that it was manipulated for political purposes.[26] In a December 2006 interview given to the television programLa storia siamo noi,[27] colonel ex-KGB agent Oleg Gordievsky, whom Scaramella claimed as his source, confirmed the accusations made against Scaramella regarding the production of false material relating to Prodi and other Italian politicians,[28] and underlined their lack of reliability.[29] Despite this, those claims were further repeated by theUK Independence Party'sGerard Batten, themember of the European Parliament forLondon who stated that he was informed of this by Litvinenko, who was his constituent and former FSB operative. The 16 February 2018 indictment ofPaul Manafort unsealed on 23 February,[30] as part of theMueller special counsel investigation, alleges that foreign politicians hypothesized to be Prodi andAlfred Gusenbauer took payments exceeding $2 million from Manafort to promote the case of his client,Viktor Yanukovich; both denied this and said their work was focused to get closerEuropean Union–Ukraine relations.[31][32]
After leaving his position in 1989, Prodi ran theBologna based consulting companyAnalisi e Studi Economici, which he jointly owned along with his wife.[33] Between 1990 and 1993 the company earned£1.4 million, most of which was paid by the investment bankGoldman Sachs.[33]
In 1993–1994, Prodi was appointed again president of the IRI, by Ciampi, where he oversaw extensive privatization of public assets. For his activities in this period Prodi would later twice come under investigation – firstly for an alleged conflict of interest in relation to contracts awarded to his own economic research company in relation to the Italdel-Siemens merger, and secondly concerning the sale of the loss-making state-owned food conglomerate SME to the multinationalUnilever, for which he had previously been a paid consultant.[33]
Prodi's former employer, Goldman Sachs, was involved in both of the deals.[33] In February 2007 the Italian Treasury Police raided theMilan office of Goldman Sachs, where they removed a file called "MTononi/memo-Prodi02.doc".[33] They also obtained a letter to Siemens from theFrankfurt office of Goldman Sachs regarding the Italdel deal, which revealed that Prodi was made the Senior Advisor of Goldman Sachs International in Italy in March 1990.[33] In November 1996, after Prodi had been elected prime minister,Rome prosecutor Guiseppa Geremia concluded that there was enough evidence to press charges against Prodi for conflict of interest in the Unilever deal. The case was, however, shut down within weeks by superiors, while Geremia was "exiled toSardinia".[33]
On 25 May 1994, Prodi went to Palazzo Chigi to announce his resignation as IRI president to the new prime ministerSilvio Berlusconi;[35] the resignation had been formalised on 31 May and became effective on 22 July.[36]
On 13 February 1995 Prodi, along with his close friendArturo Parisi, founded his political allianceThe Olive Tree.[39] Prodi's aim was to build a centre-left coalition composed by centrist and leftist parties, opposed to the centre-right alliance led by Silvio Berlusconi, who resigned from the office of prime minister few weeks before, whenLega Nord withdrew his support to the government. The movement was immediately supported byMariotto Segni, leader of the centristSegni Pact; after few weeks the post-communistDemocratic Party of the Left ofMassimo D'Alema, the PPI and theFederation of the Greens also joined the Olive Tree coalition.
On 19 February 1996, the outgoing Prime MinisterLamberto Dini announced that he would run in the election with a new party calledItalian Renewal, allied with Prodi's Olive Tree rather than Berlusconi'sPole for Freedoms. Shortly after, Berlusconi claimed that Dini "copied his electoral programme".[40]
On election day, Prodi's Olive Tree coalition won over Berlusconi's Pole for Freedoms, becoming the first coalition composed of a post-communist party to win a general election since theSecond World War. In the Senate, The Olive Tree obtained the majority; in the Chamber, it required the external support ofCommunist Refoundation Party. On 17 May 1996, Prodi received from PresidentOscar Luigi Scalfaro the task of forming a new government.[41] He ultimately formed a23-member cabinet that included 16 PDS ministers (including Deputy Prime MinisterWalter Veltroni) and 10 PDS junior ministers–the first (former) Communists to take part in government in half a century.
Prodi's economic programme consisted in continuing the past governments' work of restoration of the country's economic health, in order to pursue the then seemingly unreachable goal of leading the country within the strictEuropean Monetary System parameters in order to allow the country to join theEuro currency. He succeeded in this in little more than six months.
During his first premiership, Prodi faced the1997 Albanian civil unrest; his government proposed the so-calledOperation Alba ("Sunrise"), a multinational peacekeeping force sent toAlbania in 1997 and led byItaly. It was intended to help the Albanian government restore law and order in their troubled country after the1997 rebellion in Albania.[42]
Following the degenerating loss of administrative control by the Government in the first days of March 1997, culminating in the desertion of most Police and many Republican Guard and Army units, leaving their armouries open to the inevitable looting which soon followed, several Nations autonomously helped evacuate their Nationals inOperation Silver Wake andOperation Libelle.
TheUN Security Council therefore agreed theUnited Nations Security Council Resolution 1101 as a stop-gap operation to manage this and buy time, laying the foundations for a planned reconstruction, which after six weeks of debate fell to theWestern European Union, creating the Multinational Albanian Police Element around a command structure of ItalianCarabinieri, which actually undertook the work of Judicial and Police reconstruction, extending into the elimination of the economic causes of the crisis.
The Italian3rd Army Corps assumed responsibility for the stop-gap mission as Operation Alba, the first multinational Italian-led Mission since World War II. Eleven contributing European Nations[43] brought humanitarian aid to a country that was in a dramatic economic and political situation.[44] In 1997, Prodi declared that "the problem of the safety of the country seems to be no longer one of external safety, but an internal one: the safety ofcitizens in their everyday life".[45]
Prodi's government fell in 1998 when theCommunist Refoundation Party withdrew its external support. This led to the formation of anew government led byMassimo D'Alema as prime minister. There are those who claim that D'Alema, along with People's Party leaderFranco Marini, deliberately engineered the collapse of the Prodi government to become prime minister himself.[46] As the result of a vote of no confidence in Prodi's government, D'Alema's nomination was passed by a single vote. This was the first occasion in the history of the Italian Republic on which a vote of no confidence had ever been called; the Republic's many previous governments had been brought down by a majority "no" vote on some crucially important piece of legislation (such as the budget).
His commission took office on 13 September 1999 following the scandal and subsequent resignation of theSanter Commission, which had damaged the reputation of the institution. It took over from the interim Marín Commission. The College consisted of 20Commissioners, which grew to 30 following theEnlargement of the European Union in 2004. It was the last commission to see two members allocated to the largermember states. This commission (the 10th) saw an increase in power and influence following theAmsterdam Treaty. Some in the media described president Prodi as being the first "Prime Minister of theEuropean Union".
It was during Prodi's presidency, in 2002, that 11 EU member states ditched their national currencies and adopted the euro as their common currency. This commission (the 10th) saw an increase in power and influence following theAmsterdam Treaty.
The treaty was the result of long negotiations which began inMessina, Sicily, on 2 June 1995, nearly forty years after the signing of theTreaty of Rome, and reached completion inAmsterdam on 18 June 1997. Following the formal signing of the Treaty on 2 October 1997, the member states engaged in an equally long and complex ratification process. The European Parliament endorsed the treaty on 19 November 1997, and after two referendums and 13 decisions by parliaments, the member states finally concluded the procedure. Under this treaty the member states agreed to devolve certain powers from national governments to theEuropean Parliament across diverse areas, including legislating on immigration, adopting civil and criminal laws, and enactingforeign and security policy (CFSP), as well as implementing institutional changes for expansion as new member nations join the EU.
Due to this increased power of the Commission President, some media described President Prodi as being the first "Prime Minister of the European Union".[47][48]
Prodi with Russian PresidentVladimir Putin in 2000Prodi with French Prime MinisterLionel Jospin in 2001Prodi with U.S. PresidentGeorge W. Bush and Swedish Prime MinisterGöran Persson with in the EU–US Summit in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2001Prodi with Azerbaijani PresidentIlham Aliyev in 2004Prodi with Turkish Prime MinisterRecep Tayyip Erdoğan in 2004
As well as the enlargement and Amsterdam Treaty, the Prodi Commission also saw the signing and enforcement of theTreaty of Nice as well as the conclusion and signing of theEuropean Constitution: in which he introduced the "Convention method" of negotiation. The treaty was signed by European leaders on 26 February 2001 and came into force on 1 February 2003.
It amended theMaastricht Treaty (or the Treaty on European Union) and theTreaty of Rome (or the Treaty establishing the European Community which, before the Maastricht Treaty, was the Treaty establishing the European Economic Community). The Treaty of Nice reformed the institutional structure of the European Union to withstand eastward expansion, a task which was originally intended to have been done by theAmsterdam Treaty but failed to be addressed at the time. The entry into force of the treaty was in doubt for a time after its initialrejection by Irish voters in a referendum in June 2001. This referendum result was reversed in a subsequent referendum held a little over a year later.
In 2004, his last year as Commission President, the European Union was enlarged to admit several more member nations, most formerly part of theSoviet bloc. It was the largest single expansion of theEuropean Union (EU), in terms of territory, number of states, and population to date; however, it was not the largest in terms of gross domestic product. It occurred on 1 May 2004.
Part of the same wave was the2007 enlargement of the European Union that saw the accession of Bulgaria and Romania, who were unable to join in 2004, but, according to the Commission, constitute part of the fifth enlargement. The commission was due to leave office on 31 October 2004, but due to opposition from theEuropean Parliament to the proposedBarroso Commission which would succeed it, it was extended and finally left office on 21 November 2004. When his mandate expired, Prodi returned to domestic politics.
Shortly before the end of his term as President of the European Commission, Prodi returned to national Italian politics at the helm of the enlarged centre-left coalition,The Union.
Having no party of his own, in order to officially state his candidacy for the2006 general election, Prodi came up with the idea of an appositeprimary election, the first of such kind to be ever introduced in Europe and seen by its creator (Prodi himself) as a democratic move to bring the public and its opinion closer to the Italian politics.
The primary election may have been foreseen an easy win for Romano Prodi, with the other candidates running mostly to "measure their strengths" in the coalition, and they often talked about reaching a certain percentage rather than winning. However, there were rumours of supporters of theHouse of Freedoms trying to participate in the elections, and vote in favour of Mastella, reputed to be the least competent of the candidates and the least likely to win against Berlusconi, other than the most centrist; other rumours indicated such "fake" left-wing voters would vote for Bertinotti, because his leadership would likely lose any grip on thepolitical centre.[52]
The election had been held nationwide on 16 October 2005, from 8 am to 10 pm. Poll stations were mainly managed on a voluntary basis; they were hosted mainly in squares, local party quarters, schools, and evenrestaurants,bars,campers and ahairdresser; some polling stations were also provided outside the country for Italians abroad. Most of the party leaders claimed a result of 1 million voters would be a good success for the election, but over four million people for the occasion went to cast a vote in the primary election.[53]
After having won the centre-left primary election, Prodi led The Union coalition in the2006 election. The Union was a heterogeneous alliance, which was formed by centrist parties likeUDEUR and communists like PRC andParty of Italian Communists.
Prodi led his coalition to the electoral campaign preceding the election, eventually on 9 and 10 April won by a very narrow margin of 25,000 votes, and a final majority of two seats in theSenate. Initial exit polls suggested a victory for Prodi, but the results narrowed as the count progressed. On 11 April 2006, Prodi declared victory;[54] Berlusconi never conceded defeat explicitly but this is not required by theItalian law.
Preliminary results showed The Union leading the House of Freedoms in theChamber of Deputies, with 340 seats to 277, thanks to obtaining a majority bonus (actual votes were distributed 49.81% to 49.74%). One more seat is allied with The Union (Aosta Valley) and 7 more seats in the foreign constituency. The House of Freedoms had secured a slight majority of Senate seats elected within Italy (155 seats to 154), but The Union won 4 of the 6 seats allocated tovoters outside Italy, giving them control of both chambers.[55]
On 19 April 2006, Italy'sSupreme Court of Cassation ruled that Prodi had indeed won the election, winning control of the Chamber of Deputies by only 24,755 votes out of more than 38 million votes cast, and winning 158 seats in the Senate to 156 for Berlusconi's coalition. Even so, Berlusconi refused to concede defeat, claiming unproven fraud.
Prodi's appointment was somewhat delayed, as the outgoing president of the Republic,Carlo Azeglio Ciampi, ended his mandate in May, not having enough time for the usual procedure (consultations made by the president, appointment of a prime minister, the motion of confidence and oath of office). After the acrimoniouselection ofGiorgio Napolitano to replace Ciampi, Prodi could proceed with his transition to government. On 16 May he was invited by Napolitano to form a government. The following day, 17 May 2006, Prodi and hissecond cabinet were sworn into office.
Prodi's new cabinet drew in politicians from across his centre-left winning coalition, in addition toTommaso Padoa-Schioppa, an unelected former official of theEuropean Central Bank with no partisan membership. Romano Prodi obtained the support for his cabinet on 19 May at theSenate and on 23 May at theChamber of Deputies.
The coalition led by Prodi, thanks to the electoral law which gave the winner a sixty-seat majority, can count on a good majority in the Chamber of Deputies but only on a very narrow majority in the Senate. The composition of the coalition was heterogeneous, combining parties ofcommunist ideology, theParty of Italian Communists andCommunist Refoundation Party, within the same government as parties ofCatholic inspiration,Democracy is Freedom – The Daisy andUDEUR. The latter was led byClemente Mastella, former chairman of Christian Democracy. Therefore, according to critics,[by whom?] it was difficult to have a single policy in different key areas, such as economics and foreign politics (for instance, Italian military presence inAfghanistan).
In foreign policy, the Prodi II Cabinet continued theengagement in Afghanistan, under UN command, while withdrawing troops from post-invasionIraq on 18 May 2006, when Prodi laid out some sense of his newforeign policy, pledging to withdraw Italian troops fromIraq and called theIraq War a "grave mistake that has not solved but increased the problem of security".[56]
The major effort of foreign ministerMassimo D'Alema concerned the aftermath of the2006 Lebanon War, being the first to offer troops to the UN for the constitution of theUNIFIL force, and assuming its command in February 2007. In fact, Prodi had a key role in the creation of a multinational peacekeeping force inLebanon following the Israel-Lebanon conflict.
Italy led negotiations with the Israeli foreign ministerTzipi Livni and was proposed by Israel to head the multinational peacekeeping mission, although the dangers of the mission for Italian troops sparked warnings from the center-right opposition that it could prove a "kamikaze" mission, with the peacekeepers sandwiched between Israel and the well-armedHezbollah.[57] Prodi and D'Alema pledged Italy's willingness to enforce the United Nations resolution on Lebanon and urged other European Union member states to do the same because the stability of the Middle East should be a chief concern for Europeans.[58]
Prodi's government faced a crisis over policies in early 2007, after just nine months of government. Three ministers in Prodi's Cabinet boycotted a vote in January to continue funding for Italian troop deployments in Afghanistan. Lawmakers approved the expansion of the US military baseCaserma Ederle at the end of January, but the victory was so narrow that Deputy Prime Minister Francesco Rutelli criticised members of the coalition who had not supported the government. At around the same time,Justice MinisterClemente Mastella, of the coalition member UDEUR, said he would rather see the government fall than support its unwed couples legislation.[59]
Tens of thousands of people marched inVicenza against the expansion of Caserma Ederle, which saw the participation of some leading far-left members of the government.[60] Harsh debates followed in the Italian Senate on 20 February 2007. Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Affairs MinisterMassimo D'Alema declared during an official visit inIbiza, Spain, that, without a majority on foreign policy affairs, the government would resign. The following day, D'Alema gave a speech at the Senate representing the government, clarifying his foreign policy and asking theSenate to vote for or against it. In spite of the fear of many senators that Prodi's defeat would returnSilvio Berlusconi to power, the Senate did not approve a motion backing Prodi's government foreign policy, two votes shy of the required majority of 160.[61]
After a government meeting on 21 February, Romano Prodi tendered his resignation to the president,Giorgio Napolitano, who cut short an official visit toBologna in order to receive the prime minister. Prodi's spokesman indicated that he would only agree to form a new Government "if, and only if, he is guaranteed the full support of all the parties in the majority from now on."[62] On 22 February, centre-left coalition party leaders backed a non-negotiable list of twelve political conditions given by Prodi as conditions of his remaining in office. President Napolitano held talks with political leaders on 23 February to decide whether to confirm Prodi's Government, ask Prodi to form a new government or call fresh elections.[63]
Following these talks, on 24 February, President Napolitano asked Prodi to remain in office but to submit to a vote of confidence in both houses.[63][64] On 28 February, the Senate voted to grant confidence to Prodi's Government. Though facing strong opposition from the centre-right coalition, the vote resulted in a 162–157 victory. Prodi then faced a vote of confidence in the lower house on 2 March, which he won as expected with a large majority of 342–198.[65]
On 14 October 2007, Prodi oversaw the merger of two main parties of the Italian centre-left,Democrats of the Left andDemocracy is Freedom – The Daisy, creating theDemocratic Party. Prodi himself led the merger of the two parties, which had been planned over a twelve-year period, and became the first President of the party. He announced his resignation from that post on 16 April 2008, two days after the Democratic Party's defeat in the general election.
After first promising to support the government, he later retracted this support, and his party followed, in part also due to pressure from theVatican, for which the government's proposed laws in regards toregistered partnerships of same-sex couples, and other liberal reforms were objectionable.[67] Mastella also cited lack of solidarity from the majority parties after the arrest of his wife, and declared that his party would vote against the government bills since then.
The decision of former Minister of Justice Mastella arrived a few days after the confirmation of theConstitutional Court which confirmed thereferendum to modify the electoral system.[68] As stated many times by Minister Mastella, if the referendum had been confirmed, it would lead directly to the fall of the government[69][70]and it happened. The fall of the government would disrupt a pending election-law referendum that, if passed, would make it harder for small parties like Mastella's to gain seats in parliament.[71]
The UDEUR defection forced caused Prodi to ask for a confidence vote in both Chambers: he won a clear majority in the Chamber of Deputies on 23 January,[72] but was defeated 156 to 161 (with 1 abstention)[73] in the Senate the next day. He therefore tendered his resignation as prime minister to PresidentGiorgio Napolitano, who accepted it and appointed the President of the Senate,Franco Marini, with the task of evaluating possibilities for forming interim government to implement electoral reforms prior to holding elections. Marini, after consultation with all major political forces, acknowledged the impossibility of doing so on 5 February, forcing Napolitano to announce the end of the legislature.[74] Prodi said that he would not seek to lead a new government and snap election were called.[75] In theelection that followed in April 2008, Berlusconi's centre-rightThe People of Freedom and allies defeated theDemocratic Party.[76]
On 19 March 2008, during the political campaign for the snap general election, Romano Prodi stated "I called it a day with Italian politics and maybe with politics in general."[77]
On 12 September 2008, Prodi was named by the UN as head of a jointAU-UN panel aimed at enhancing peacekeeping operations in Africa.[78]
On 6 February 2009, he was appointed Professor-at-Large at theWatson Institute for International Studies ofBrown University.[79] Since 2010 Romano Prodi is the chair for Sino-European dialogue at the China Europe International Business School (CEIBS – Shanghai&Beijing), China's leading business school.
On 9 October 2012, Romano Prodi was appointed by theUN Secretary-GeneralBan Ki-moon as his Special Envoy for the Sahel. He served in that position until 31 January 2014.[80]
Prodi is also a member of the Club de Madrid, an international organization of former democratic statesmen, which works to strengthen democratic governance and leadership.[81] He is a former member of the Steering Committee of theBilderberg Group.[82]
On 16 April 2013, just a few days prior to the fourth ballot, Prodi gave alectio magistralis at thePontifical University of St. Thomas Aquinas,Angelicum entitled "I grandi cambiamenti della politica e dell'economia mondiale: c'è un posto per l'Europa?" ("The Great Changes in Politics and the World Economy: Is there Room for Europe?). Prodi was sponsored by theAngelicum and the Università degli Studi Guglielmo Marconi[83] on behalf of the Political Science program "Scienze Politiche e del Buon Governo."[84]
A few days later, on 19 April, starting on the fourth ballot, Prodi was looked at seriously as a possible candidate. However, Prodi announced he was pulling out of the presidential race after more than 100 centre-left electors did not vote for him as he received only 395 (of 504 votes needed to be elected). After this vote,Pier Luigi Bersani, leader of the centre-left Democratic Party, announced his resignation as the party's secretary.[85] As of September 2020, he is a member of the ItalianAspen Institute.[86]
^Erlanger, Steven; Horowitz, Jason (24 February 2018)."European Ex-Officials Deny Being Paid by Manafort to Lobby for Ukraine".The New York Times.ISSN0362-4331. Retrieved26 July 2023.On Saturday, Romano Prodi, a former prime minister of Italy, said in an interview that he and an ex-chancellor of Austria, Alfred Gusenbauer, had worked to try to bring Ukraine and the European Union closer together. But Mr. Prodi said the funds he had been paid by Mr. Gusenbauer did not come, to his knowledge, from Mr. Manafort. The compensation from Mr. Gusenbauer was a result of the 'normal private relations I had with him,' Mr. Prodi said, but 'not any money from external sources.' He added: 'I tell you I have never been paid from any lobby group in America.' In a statement to the BBC, Mr. Gusenbauer, who led Austria from January 2007 to December 2008, denied any involvement in Mr. Manafort's work in Ukraine but acknowledged that he had met him twice and talked to European and American politicians about Ukraine, as Mr. Prodi had also done. ... Mr. Prodi said that Mr. Gusenbauer was the 'coordinator' of a group of like-minded liberal and center-left politicians on the issue. ... Mr. Prodi recalled meeting members of Congress interested in Ukraine, but said he had not heard of Mercury. Asked who scheduled the meetings in Washington, Mr. Prodi said, 'I imagine it was Gusenbauer.' ... Asked if the money Mr. Gusenbauer received came from Mr. Manafort, Mr. Prodi seemed skeptical but said that he didn't know. 'Go ask Gusenbauer,' he said, adding that he thought that it was more likely that the money came from European businessmen interested in keeping Europe and Ukraine close.
^Meyer, Theodoric; Gerstein, Josh (23 February 2018)."Former Austrian chancellor appears to have lobbied as part of Manafort scheme".Politico. Retrieved5 October 2021.Kutler also accompanied Romano Prodi, a former Italian prime minister, to meetings with Royce and a staffer for House Majority Whip Eric Cantor months beforehand. Gusenbauer and Prodi said their work was focused on bringing Ukraine and the European Union closer together and denied being paid by Yanukovych or Manafort. ... Prodi told The New York Times on Saturday that he'd been paid by Gusenbauer as part of the 'normal private relations I had with him' and they the money had not, to his knowledge, come from Manafort. He said he'd never heard of the Hapsburg Group. 'It was Gusenbauer heading the group; we did all our efforts to have peace in Ukraine,' Prodi said. The group, which consisted of 'experts and former politicians,' broke up when it became clear that 'a stronger relationship with the European Union was impossible,' he added.
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