4 October 2006

Financing the Parties

The recent TV programme called Report by Milena Gabanelli dealt with the financing of parties by companies. The programme dealt with the financing during the election campaign coming from those companies that hold State concessions.

Here we have activity that is technically legal, but to be condemned from the point of view of ethics, morality and common sense. The concessionaire companies get concessions from the State and at the same time provide finance to the parties making up the government.
In the case of motorway concessionaires the financing comes from the tolls paid by the citizens. Basically, the motorway tolls paid by citizens are financing the parties through the concessionaires that operate with hardly any business risks.
The Autostrade company {running the motorways} has given massive sums to many parties. Italia dei Valori immediately gave back the ‘donation’ of 20.000 €. Other parties haven’t done the same. That’s their choice even though I don’t have the same viewpoint.
In fact I don’t think that it is appropriate that a State concessionaire should pay money to the parties using money from the citizens so that they can get possible favours.
Let them instead reduce the tariffs.

This list shows the amounts parties received from Autostrade in 2006:

Alleanza Nazionale 150,000 €
Comitati per Prodi 150,000 €
Margherita 150,000 €
DS 150,000 €
Forza Italia 150,000 €
Lega Nord 150,000 €
Udeur 50,000 €
UDC 150,000 €

Posted by Antonio Di Pietro in Information