Berlusconi’s Government May Not Survive the Year : Italy: A day after the prime minister’s interrogation by judges, a coalition partner breaks ranks in Parliament.

In a heady spring of change and promise, he vaulted to power almost effortlessly, bringing new ideas, plans and promises to a country dispirited by cronyism and political corruption. Now, seven months later, Silvio Berlusconi’s days in power seem numbered.

One day after magistrates interrogated the prime minister in a bribery case involving his Fininvest business empire--”a spectacle of injustice,” he snapped--Berlusconi’s right-wing coalition splintered in Parliament on Wednesday as support for his leadership eroded.

Today many Berlusconi allies and enemies alike arise convinced that the government that promised Italians a brighter future may not live out the year. “The Berlusconi chapter is closed. . . . We think the government is finished,” said Marco Formentini, mayor of Milan and a nominal Berlusconi ally. “It’s time to think of a new political alliance.”

Formentini represents the Northern League, a populist-federalist party that had been a pillar of Berlusconi’s coalition. On Wednesday, the League broke with the government, voting with the opposition for formation of a special commission to oversee a reorganization of Italian broadcasting. Berlusconi’s $7-billion-a-year interests include ownership of three of Italy’s seven national television channels.

League supporters exchanged shouts and abuse Wednesday on the Parliament floor with legislators of Berlusconi’s Forza Italia and the National Alliance, its extreme-right-wing stablemate. “The moment of truth is coming,” said Alliance leader Gianfranco Fini.

An atmosphere of political crisis hung over chilly, polluted streets around the downtown Parliament on Wednesday night as politicians maneuvered in search of a fulcrum.

In the next few days, the Senate is likely to approve Berlusconi’s austerity 1995 budget; it must pass by year’s end. Once that is done, Berlusconi says he will ask for a vote of confidence, a move that could bring down his government.

The 58-year-old Milan entrepreneur emerged from an eight-hour session with magistrates in Milan on Tuesday in a cold fury. The magistrates believe he may have known of about $205,000 in bribes allegedly paid by Fininvest to tax inspectors in 1990 and 1991.

“There is no shred of paper or any person to affirm that I ordered any illegal acts or was aware of any in conducting my businesses,” Berlusconi said.

Claiming their inquiries are politically motivated, the government is dueling with judges who have led a corruption probe that has ensnared more than 3,000 business leaders, public officials and politicians.

“Against me and my government there is a plot whose vastness and intensity could be compared to a coup d’etat,” Berlusconi complained after meeting the judges. Conspirators, he said, “want a crisis, and they are working so that things go badly with the sole purpose of getting rid of me.”