The curious case of Mr Visco
Mr Visco, who is a deputy economy minister in Prodi’s band of brothers, has got himself into a spot of bother after he tried, apparently, to pressurise the head of the Guardia di Finanza, the Italian financial police, to ‘transfer’ a number of Guardia di Finanza operatives away from Milan.
Now, it just so happens, or so the story goes, that said GdF operatives were working on a couple of cases which involved the business interests (Interpol and Coop) of some of those politicians who have joined together with Prodi to form his rag-tag coalition government.
Of course, noises are being made along the lines that Mr Visco was trying to ‘transfer’ people away to avoid their getting a little too close to information that might embarrass certain government bigwigs. Prodi is standing by his man, who he thinks is a jolly good egg.
The story, which was broken by one of the right leaning newspapers here, Il Giornale, is still brewing.
This story is rather odd, seeing as the Berlusco government was accused of making laws to protect Berlusco and friends’ interests, as it seems to appear that Prodi’s mob have probably been up to the same thing, albeit using a slightly different method. After all, Prodi’s government seems to have enough problems getting any laws passed, let alone those to keep his friends happy.
Life in the living museum - never a dull day.
Montezemolo roasts the politicians
Montezemolo, the president of Ferrari and chairman of FIAT, and head of the Italian employers’ federation - Confindustria - spoke at a conference the other day. He commented that the current band of politicians where not really doing anything to assist Italy or businesses in Italy. Prodi and his mob were at the front at this conference and could be seen to be writhing in their seats.
He has a point, does Mr Montezemolo. Like it or not, Italy relies on businesses to generate employment and keep taxes flowing into government coffers. Ineffectual politicians do not enamour themselves to the business crowd here and Montezemolo made this very clear.
These comments have two potential effects in my opinion. First, they might wake Prodi and co up and cause them to put a stop to the coalition in-fighting and actually get on with governing the living museum. Or, the other potential effect could be that confidence in the Prodi government reaches an all time low and the government fails. The first scenario is preferable, but somewhat unlikely.
What would be best for Italy would be for Prodi, Rutelli, Bertinotti and Fassino to finally get the message and step down, leaving the road to power open to some new faces. However, knowing how Italian politicians love to have careers which last until they are on their last legs, I cannot imagine this actually happening. Alas.
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Photos from Flickr
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