The 2006 Italian general election was the first in the country's history in which Italian and dual citizens living outside the country could vote by postal ballot in international electoral districts. Twelve members of the Italian Chamber of Deputies and six members of the Italian Senate were elected in this way. Italian and dual citizens in North America and Central America (including the Caribbean) elected one member of the Italian Senate. The winning candidate was Renato Turano of Romano Prodi's election coalition, The Union. The process All electors could vote for a political list and also cast a first preference vote for a specific candidate. The party with the highest number of list votes won the Senate seat, and the winning party's candidate with the most first preference votes was declared elected. The parties Seven electoral lists contested the North and Central American Senate division. The same lists also fielded candidates for the Chamber of Deputies and North and Central America. Prime minister Silvio Berlusconi's right-wing Forza Italia party ran its own slate. Two other parties aligned with Berlusconi's government ran separate lists: the moderate conservative Union of Christian and Centre Democrats and Mirko Tremaglia's right-wing For Italy in the World, which was specifically focused on diaspora issues. (Another party in Berlusconi's coalition, the Lega Nord, also appeared on the ballot, although this seems to have been due to a technical error). The main opposition group from the previous parliament, Romano Prodi's centre-left Union party, ran a united slate. One of the Union candidates noted that the state of the party lists favoured his group's chances of election. The centrist Independent Alternative for Italians Abroad also fielded a list, as did the far-right Tricolour Flame party. Each of the party lists comprised two candidates, except for the Northern League and Tricolour Flame which fielded one apiece. The candidates The Union Renato Turano is a Chicago baking executive who was active in the Italian expatriate community for several years before his election. He served in the Italian Senate from 2006 to 2008. Rocco di Trolio was born in Calabritto, Italy. He moved to the United Kingdom at age seventeen and became active with the British Labour Party, also serving as secretary of the Italian Socialist Party in England. He joined the Italian overseas social services agency in 1981 and moved to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, in 1990, where he oversaw the