'Mafia Capitale' probe sends shock waves through Rome

(ANSA) - Rome, December 5 - Rome center-left Mayor Ignazio Marino said Friday he feels "more strength and determination" than before the eruption of the mafia scandal that has sent shock waves through the city over the past week. A massive ongoing probe has uncovered an alleged crime syndicate in the capital led by ex-rightwing terrorist Massimo Carminati and involving contractors and high-ranking politicians.
    Marino defended his record since he took office in 2013 and outlined in detail the measures he took to end illegal practices and corruption he discovered after his election.
    Asked if he would accept a police escort, Marino said he would decide by the weekend, pledging not to use his beloved bicycle for travelling around the city till then. As well, Marino said he might appoint a person tasked with "transparency and legality" to help deal with the corruption scandal sweeping the city. Also on Friday, Senate Speaker Piero Grasso rejected calls from some politicians to break up the current administration. He was echoed by PD national President Matteo Orfini, who has been put in charge of the Rome branch of the party after this week's probe.
    "This (Marino's) administration has been a dam against the criminal powers and what emerges shows there was an attack on this administration," Orfini said. More than 100 people are under investigation, including the man who Marino replaced as mayor in 2013, Gianni Alemanno, a right-wing politician and former agriculture minister under ex-premier Silvio Berlusconi.
    As well, some 37 people were arrested on Tuesday. Several of those being investigated were expected to appear before an investigating magistrate on Saturday. Marino has so far emerged from the probe as being an incorruptible figure, but some members of his and Premier Matteo Renzi's centre-left Democratic Party (PD) have been implicated in the scandal. Italy's anti-corruption czar Raffaele Cantone on Thursday said his authority would order any contracts that are tainted by organised crime to be removed from the firms or cooperatives that have them.
    "We told Marino that we will run checks on the contracts and we will put those won thanks to corruption in the hands of commissioners," Cantone said after meeting the mayor. Lazio Governor Nicola Zingaretti said the regional government has suspended the awarding of all contracts while it conducts an internal investigation to find possible mafia infiltration there. Among those put behind bars Tuesday was the Roman mobsters' alleged leader Massimo Carminati, a former member of the NAR neofascist terrorist group and of the Banda della Magliana crime gang.
    The organisation allegedly made millions by rigging contracts in fields including waste management, park maintenance, migrant and refugee reception centers (CIEs) and Roma camps.
    Salvatore Buzzi, a former manslaughter convict who headed cooperatives implicated in the scandal, seemed to boast about how much profit his gang was making off scamming city settlement centres.
    "Do you have any idea how much I make on these immigrants?" Buzzi allegedly says in a wiretap from early 2013 contained in prosecution documents. "Drug trafficking is not as profitable".