Future Republic: games in the Council
That things inside NPL weren’t exactly idyllic was now clear to everyone. The electoral placard set up haphazardly before the elections between fellow travelers who have shown that they sincerely hate each other and have nothing to do with each other except the insane fear of not passing the barrier (a concrete fear that evidently the sympathetic NPR host , Gian Nicola Berti, had already experimented on his skin, helping to bury We of San Marino and succeeding in the enterprise of being trumped in a previous electoral round). It is known that unity is strength, and so in political alchemy, socialists, democrats, liberals, right-wing extremist liberals, justicialists, pro-Europeans, sovereignists at the Mistrà, statists, can coexist without embarrassment just to stay attached to the chair. Who knows if friends of NPR have also made these considerations? Today the internal anguish is palpable: it is no longer clear who is with whom, if the PSD is also with the PS, if Pedini Amati will be the man of providence who will no longer run as a candidate – he has been declaring it for months, moreover not requested – but it will save the NPR galaxy. However, the two things seem certain: one, that an old lion from the past, famous for having had a little argent de poche at home (a million euros, more or less) and some problems with justice, is still the mentor of the PSD meeting. And, two, that the PSD reunion has taken place, so far, in the Court, in the trial for the famous anonymous letter used to get Iro Belluzzi out of the Justice Commission, tarnishing his reputation and subjecting him to a real political lynching which, in many by now, let’s assume it originated right inside NPR. And so, faced with the striking case of Alessandro Mancini, who became famous during the electoral campaign for making us dream with the cry: “we were fine” – effectively erecting a monument to the period of anonymous companies and banking secrecy, when transparency was blasphemy – the bomb exploded. Consistent with the contempt for transparency shown in his electoral campaign, Mancini – entrepreneur and consultant, as he defined himself in his commercials – has refused to dare to apply the code of ethics of the Councilors and to make his debt positions public. You got it right: the president of the Finance Commission, the one that must, for example, closely follow trivial questions such as the affairs of the State Bank, the foreign debt, the implementation of the NPL project, refuses, alone among the directors, to make public the debt positions of the companies of which he is a shareholder. Of course, the morbidity of getting into other people’s affairs is not at stake here, of course, but only the sacrosanct principle, established by GRECO (which the majority is evidently inspired by alternating current), of avoiding conflicts of interest. The question is simple: how do the banks to which he is directly or indirectly indebted deal with a debtor who is also a member of the Great and General Council? Or how do banks behave in the face of a director who asks to take out a debt with a bank? As with an ordinary citizen or in a “particular” way? Let me be clear, we are not saying that these things have happened in Mancini’s case, we are simply explaining some of the principles on the basis of which the Great and General Council has unanimously added the code of ethics. After various interventions by the opposition – Repubblica Futura asked Mancini to take a step back from the chairmanship of the commission in the deafening silence of the majority – the inevitable Gian Nicola Berti launched himself as star performer. Greased by years of banking and “institutional” consultancy in this legislature, heedless of his constant conflicts of interest so much so that he often speaks in the Council of cases that concern him or the quarrels of his clients, it seemed evidently normal to abandon himself to his inspiration defensive towards Mancini. The arguments were hilarious and noteworthy. First the usual invective about civil servants, then the clamorous proposal to publish debts, non-performing loans, announcements of the incomes of all San Marino citizens – this time he was especially targeting civil servants and the civil police – then the somewhat risky affirmation that if Mancini has debts, he is evidently a good politician because he hasn’t stolen (sic!). This would be enough, but in the end Berti outraged with a new invective: the declarations of some Councilors regarding the code of ethics are false! Typical: Is your customer cooked? throw it in the caciara and maybe you can make someone look more guilty than him. Repubblica Futura can tolerate the internal quarrels of an agonizing electoral cartel, and also the usual insults from those who have evidently lost all political sense – if they ever had it. It certainly cannot tolerate the dignity and credibility of the Great and General Council being undermined by affirmations that must be thoroughly verified and examined. If Berti knows that some adviser has provided bogus data, name names, if he, on the other hand, is just a cheap game, apologize and draw the consequences for his political career.
future republic