Orlando to go to TAR abt prefects

(ANSA) - Palermo, April 18 - Palermo Mayor Leoluca Orlando said Thursday he was ready to resort to the regional administrative tribunal (TAR) against Interior Minister Matteo Salvini's new directive granting prefects the power to step in in place of mayors when the latter were judged not to be doing enough to fight crime and urban decay in so-called 'red zones' of cities.
    "If the prefect of Palermo were to fall into line with the interior minister's directive I will appeal to the TAR on the so-called red zones," Orlando told a press conference.
    "This is a sign of the political involution of this minister, he talks of hunting delinquents, I'm asking what the juridical expression is".
    Prefects will be able to fill in for mayors when first citizens are "distracted" on issues like high crime and urban decay, League leader and Interior Minister Matteo Salvini said in unveiling a new directive Wednesday.
    "The interior ministry and the security decree offer extra weapons to fight squats, decay, illegal buildings and crime", he said on the directive that envisages greater prefect powers in so-called red zones.
    Salvini has criticised Rome Mayor Virginia Raggi on issues including dysfunctional transport and gridlocked traffic, potholes, uncollected trash and degraded green spaces.
    On Wednesday he said "Roma is stupendous and does not deserve the situation it is in...
    "Is it a clean city, well-organised, well-functioning, with streets without potholes. Doesn't look that way to me".
    The other deputy premier, 5-Star Movement (M5S) leader Luigi Di Maio, defended Raggi, who is an M5S member, and criticised Salvini's directive.
    "I'm of the opinion that citizens choose who govern.
    "It's the ABC of democracy.
    "You express a vote and then you judge at the end of their mandate.
    "That's the way I see it".
    The head of the Italian mayors association, Bari Mayor Antonio Decaro, said "we mayors will not be commissioned off".
    He said Salvini "does not miss a chance to attack us".
    "If Salvini had convened us we would have told him that designating red zones is a bit like sweeping the dust under the carpet: it doesn't solve the problem but simply moves it elsewhere."