Giuseppe 'Giosi' Ferrandino, the
mayor of Ischia, was among 10 people arrested Monday in a probe
into alleged bribes on the Bay of Naples island in the latest in
a stream of graft probes that have spanned the nation and the
political and business worlds.
The probe involved one of the biggest of Italy's leftwing
cooperative companies, Gruppo CPL Concordia
Ferrandino, mayor for seven years, is a member of Premier
Matteo Renzi's centre-left Democratic Party (PD).
Ferrandino's brother Massimo Ferrandino was also arrested
along with several officials from CPL Concordia, a huge former
Communist cooperative founded in Modena in 1899 and employing
some 1,800 people, with 70 branches worldwide.
Prosecutors believe that CPL Concordia created slush funds
in Tunisia to be able to pay officials for "favours" when it
came to assigning public contracts, the sources said.
Investigation documents allege that CPL Concordia signed
two sham conventions worth 330,000 euros with the Ferrandino
family hotel, hired Massimo Ferrandino as a consultant and paid
for at least one holiday in Tunisia in exchange for the alleged
favours.
The investigators believe CPL Concordia executives also
paid money to members of the Campania mafia, the Camorra, as
part of the scam.
They allegedly "made systematic use of an organisational
model aimed at corruption that led them to make agreements not
just with mayors, local politicians and civil servants, but also
with members of the province of Caserta's organised crime and
administrators linked to those criminal spheres", read the
investigation documents, according to judicial sources.
Former premier Massimo D'Alema said he had not done
anything illegal after his name was mentioned in the wiretap of
a conversation by a CPL Concordia manager.
"I certainly do have relations with CPL Concordia, but the
relationship is totally transparent," D'Alema said.
"It did not entail requests from them or acts by me of an
illegal nature of any form".
D'Alema, a former leader of one of the PD's post-Communist
precedessor parties, added that his relations with CPL Concordia
had not brought him "any personal benefit".
"I didn't get any presents," added the 65-year-old
ex-Communist, who was premier from October 1998 to April 2000
and served as foreign minister in Romano Prodi's 2006-2008
government.
"The publication of reports and wiretaps that have no
pertinence to the judicial case that the Naples prosecutors are
dealing with is scandalous and offensive".
D'Alema's name is mentioned by Francesco Simone, a CPL
manager who was one of the 10 people arrested on Monday.
"It is necessary to invest in Italiani Europei (the
European Italians foundation), where D'Alema is about to become
European commissioner... D'Alema puts his hands in s**t, as he
has in the past with us, he gave us things," Simone said,
according to the transcription.
In the warrant for Monday's arrests, a preliminary
investigations judge said it was "significant" that CPL
Concordia bought "several thousand copies of the latest book" by
D'Alema and 2,000 bottles of wine from a company linked to his
family.
The Legacoop association of leftwing cooperatives said it
"would not shield anyone" if it was asked to cooperate with
investigators.
The PD's political enemies tried to make capital out of
the probe.
The anti-establishment 5-Star Movement claimed "leftwing
cooperatives are diabolical and the CPL case is emblematic" of
corruption probes that have involved the cooperative movement,
one of them involving Italy's oldest bank, Monte dei Paschi di
Siena (MPS).
Italy has seen a seemingly endless series of graft probes
involving all major parties in recent years, prompting recently
named anti-corruption czar Raffaele Cantone to say the fight
against corruption was "just as vital" for the nation's future
as the one against the mafia.
Graft probes, often involving illegal party funding, have
touched all political sides, while kickbacks investigations have
reached to major prestige projects like this year's Expo world's
fair and Venice's MOSE flood barriers.
Most recently a huge public-works graft scandal, where
costs were inflated by 40%, led to the resignation of
Infrastructure Minister Maurizio Lupi, even though he was not
under investigation.
Corruption is said to cost Italy some 60 billion euros a
year and Italy lags its European and OECD partners in
international corruption perception polls.
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