Sports Minister Luca Lotti told a
Senate no-confidence debate Wednesday that he strongly denied
telling the head of civil-service procurement agency CONSIP,
Luigi Marroni, that there was an investigation into the agency.
He accused those who said he had revealed the probe of
"calumny".
Lotti, who is expected to survive the vote, voiced full
confidence in the judiciary and said he was dealing with the
probe with "my head held high".
He said the opponents of the ruling centre-left Democratic
Party (PD) and its former leader, ex-premier Matteo Renzi, were
using the probe "to strike at a political season".
Lotti added: "We won't let the Senate be used for media
lynching".
Lotti, Renzi's right-hand man, is facing a no-confidence
motion over the CONSIP probe from the anti-establishment 5-Star
Movement (M5S).
He is also facing a censure motion from a group that recently
split from the PD, the small Democratic and Progressive Movement
(MDP).
Lotti called them "culturally subaltern and politically
incorrect".
The MDP wants Lotti to be stripped of two of his three
portfolios, for the publishing and media industry and for the
interministerial economic planning committee (CIPE), leaving him
with just the sports brief.
The MDP said it would not take part in the no-confidence
vote.
Also involved in the CONSIP probe, for suspected
influence-peddling, is Renzi's father Tiziano, who has stepped
down as chief of his local PD chapter near Florence.
Renzi, former Florence mayor, quit as premier after losing a
Constitutional reform referendum in December and as PD chief
last month to trigger a party congress and his likely
re-election.
Marroni, the CONSIP chief, says Lotti tipped him off on the
probe, enabling him to get rid of listening devices from his
office.
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