Renzi not phoned to avert PD split, Delrio overheard saying

(ANSA) - Rome, February 17 - Democratic Party (PD) leader and ex-premier Matteo Renzi "hasn't even phoned" dissenting minority leaders to avert a looming split in the centre-left group, confidant and Transport Minister Graziano Delrio said in an overheard remark Friday.
    "How the f**k don't you make a phone call in a situation like this," Delrio said during a meeting on Rome's public transport system.
    Later, however, Delrio clarified what he thought, saying "Matteo made an appeal (in a newspaper interview) to take alibis away (from the minority), much more than a phone call".
    And Puglia Governor and PD leadership candidate Michele Emiliano said that Renzi "called me and we spoke, I hope our talks are useful for the upcoming decisions" to avert a PD split.
    In the newspaper interview earlier, Renzi appealed to the leftwing minority not to split and instead express its views at an assembly on Sunday called to decide the date of a party congress.
    "Don't go, come, take part, the doors are open, no one is ejecting anyone, let's start talking about Italy again," he said in the interview with Corriere della Sera.
    On Facebook, later, he said: "We must stop talking about issues that only interest Roman palazzi. And start giving solutions to Italian's problems again." Culture Minister Dario Franceschini, head of a middle-ground faction, tried a last-minute mediation, saying a split now would be "incomprehensible" and urging Renzi to concede some ground on the date of the party congress and a general election, as well as his alleged bid to turn the PD into a personal party.
    "Those who have most responsibility must also be the most generous, and make the biggest effort," he said.
    On the leftwing minority side, Emiliano said "Renzi is Napoleonic, and so he's heading for some Waterloos.
    "Let him avert the biggest disaster of the European left. The solution is one step away, it would be enough to hold the congress in May".
    Emiliano said later PD will not split if Renzi grants a request from the minority to hold primaries in September. "I'm going to try and call Renzi, seeing that he's not calling us. "If he says yes there'll be no split," said Emiliano.
    Renzi's plea to avert a split will not achieve that goal, one of the other minority leaders, PD MP Gianni Cuperlo, said. "It's not going to be a newspaper interview that fixes it. "You need humility...a leadership group meets...to say the harshest things to one's face and see how to go on".
    Renzi wants a congress in April and a general election in September.
    The minority, which includes former leader Pier Luigi Bersani and two other leadership candidates, Tuscany Governor Enrico Rossi and former House whip Roberto Speranza, want a congress to be put off and Premier Paolo Gentiloni to serve out the government's term until February next year.
    Gentiloni, also of the PD and former foreign minister in Renzi's government, replaced Renzi as premier when the PD leader resigned following an unexpectedly heavy defeat in a Constitutional reform referendum in December.