Raffaele Cantone, the head of
Italy's anti-corruption authority, said Monday that he was
"astonished" after Naples prosecutors said at the weekend that
they were probing alleged fraud by officials working for NGOs
dealing with the migrant emergency.
It was the latest in a string of cases of graft where NGOs
or collectives, usually leftwing, were found to have illicitly
profited from the migrant-reception business.
Asking for the probe files to see if a commissioner was
needed and to review migrant procedures across Campania, Cantone
called on civil society and the professional world "to not
entrench itself behind a corporate mentality".
"There needs to be a united effort of all parts of civil
society, which, too often in the best case scenario, have simply
looked on, and in some cases have been complicit in illicit
activity," Cantone said.
"If civil society doesn't do its part, it's hard to think
that we can do it," he said.
Cantone's comments follow the Saturday arrest of Alfonso De
Martino, president of the non-profit Un'Ala di Riserva, accused
of stealing more than one million euros intended for migrant aid
and investing the money in property and phone cards.
De Martino's partner Rosa Carnevale was placed on house
arrest, and two people associated with Catholic aid organization
Caritas in Teggiano Policastro, including Father Vincenzo
Federico, are under investigation for graft.
Caritas in Teggiano Policastro, located in the province of
Salerno, manages four immigrant reception centers and
investigators said it's "likely" they are tied into the scandal
that brought the Saturday arrests.
Father Federico told ANSA Monday he trusts in the
judiciary.
"I have always been committed to trying to alleviate these
people's suffering," said Father Federico, who directs a Caritas
branch in Teggiano.
"I won't comment on the investigation but I trust in the
judiciary," said the priest, who also heads the Caritas Campania
chapter.
The president of the NGO, De Martino, will be questioned in
front of the preliminary investigations judge Tuesday.
Monday's case is the latest in a stream of graft scandals
where corrupt businessmen and voluntary workers, mainly from
leftwing cooperatives, have been found to be making a killing
from funds attached to the migrant-management business.
Perhaps the biggest scam was revealed in the case of a new
Roman mafia, dubbed Capital Mafia, some of whose top members
were heard on a wiretap saying "there's more money in migrants
and gypsies (Roma) than there is in drugs".
Cantone meanwhile called the government's new
anti-corruption legislation "the best that could be done".
He said the fight against corruption is "betting on young
people's future" and "an instrument for blocking a system that
creates problems above all for deserving people".
In a lesson for students at Naples' Federico II University,
Cantone discussed the anti-graft law approved by the government
last week.
"It's a good law, the best that could have been done in
this moment," without creating division between political
factions, he said.
He praised elements of the law, including the
reintroduction of false accounting as a crime, reduced sentences
for collaborators of justice, and a modification that makes
bribery in public service a crime and strengthens related
penalties.
Cantone also touched on the problem of how to manage assets
seized in the fight against organized crime.
"Intelligent work in asset management is indispensable;
these assets can't be an extra burden on State finances and
above all must be an opportunity for economic development,"
Cantone said.
Cantone said there's a need for a "new logic, a sort of
economic start-up and not initiatives that are often just
unrealistic".
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