Whose side are the two major Italian parties, the PDL (Berlusconi's party) and the PD (Democratic party)? On the side of police officers and judges who risk their lives every day to fight the Mafia or on the side of mobsters? The doubt is more than legitimate given the number of politicians of these parties, local and otherwise, who ended up involved in several Mafia investigations. Dell'Utri and Cosentino are obviously the best known at this time regarding the PDL.
But the number of politicians under investigation, for example in Campania, is remarkable and very bipartisan. In Sicily there are suspects for mafia in the PDL, in PD and in the UDC (Center Christian party). In Calabria it is known that the Why Not investigation was about the infiltration of the 'Ndrangheta (Calabrian mafia) in politics and in business, and in fact everything was done by politics to hinder the judiciary, but the politicians are still so many among defendants. Even in Apulia, the situation is no better, both in PDL than in the left.
It's still possible that some or many of these people are actually innocent, but in every decent country in the world when a politician is suspected the first thing he does is to resign from all public office. Then, if he proves his innocence, he can always stand as candidate again. But in Italy of course things never go in such a way. Politicians who have a seat keep it tight because they know that if they let go someone else will sit immediately in their place.
But we must understand that maintain relations with criminal organizations that use systematic intimidation, corruption and murder to have the domain of their territory is not compatible neither with politics nor with the basic human coexistence. But unfortunately this kind of politicians continues to have votes from mafia in exchange of aid. It should therefore be the task of national political leaders from different parties to distance themselves from this kind of behaviour and check rigorously that no candidate, small or large, has any relationship with the Mafia, of any kind. Now it's obvious that in any other European country, no decent party would ever have candidate Cosentino, whose brother is brother in law of a famous mafia boss, because the risk is too high that he can receive pressure.
Besides, in these days, the law passed by government that allows the public auctions of the unlawfully obtained property seized to the Mafia is basically an invitation for criminal organizations to buy them back. Interior Minister Maroni said that the prefects will ensure that this does not happen. But wouldn't be better to completely avoid this danger, as has been done so far with good results? Former mafia properties, houses or terrains, were in fact assigned to social use. Ditto for the tax amnesty: why not provide countermeasures to prevent it from being used by criminal organizations as a mean of money laundering?
If the national leaderships of the major Italian parties have no concern of the moral question, and when in the government they pass laws that may favor organized crime, then we must ask ourselves: which side are they? And the answer is really very easy. It would be useful if italian citizens remember that, when they go to vote.
Francesco Defferrari
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