a de facto particracy (partitocrazia). From the 1980s the party was divided between the centre-right led by Arnaldo Forlani (supported also by the party's right wing) and the centre-left led by Ciriaco De Mita (whose supporters included trade unionists and the internal left), with Andreotti holding the balance. De Mita, who led the party from 1982 to 1989, tried to transform the party into a mainstream "conservative party" in line with the European People's Party to preserve party unity. He became Prime Minister in 1988 but was replaced by Forlani in 1989. Disagreements between de Mita and Forlani brought Andreotti back to the prime-ministership from 1989 to 1992. With the fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the great Cold War ideological conflict, and ultimately the Tangentopoli scandals, the heterogeneous nature of the party led it to its collapse. The bulk of the DC's membershipjoined the new Italian People's Party (PPI), but immediately several centre-right elements led by Pier Ferdinando Casini joined the Christian Democratic Centre (CCD), while others directly joined Forza Italia. A split from the PPI, the United Christian Democrats (CDU), joined Forza Italia and the CCD in the centre-right Pole of Freedoms coalition (later becoming the Pole for Freedoms), while the PPI was a founding member of The Olive Tree centre-left coalition in 1996. Popular support In its early years, the party was stronger in Northern Italy (especially in eastern Lombardy and Veneto), due to the strong Catholic roots of those areas, than it was in the South. There, the Liberal establishment that had governed Italy for decades before the rise of Benito Mussolini still had grip on voters, as well as the Monarchist National Party and the Common Man's Front. The DC was very weak in Emilia-Romagna and Central Italy, where the Italian Communist Party was the dominant political force. In the 1948 general election the party had its best result ever (48.5%) and an absolute majority in the Italian Parliament. The party won 66.8% in eastern Lombardy (73.6% in the Province of Bergamo), 60.5% in Veneto (71.9% in the Province of Vicenza), 69.6% in Trentino and 57.8% in Friuli-Venezia Giulia, that is to say where the late Italian People's Party had its strongholds. In the Centre-South the DC gained more than 50% of the vote in Lazio (51.9%), Abruzzo (53.7%) and Campania (50.5%). From the late 1950s, the DC's support started to move