28 March 2007

Conflict of interests and democracy

Conflict of interests is a threat to democracy. In particular in relation to news. Silvio Berlusconi became President of the Council just because of his TV channels and his newspapers.

Every citizen in a situation of conflict of interests must not be a candidate. They must not be electable. The government must energetically propose a law on the conflict of interests that is real, not warm flannels or smoke in the eyes of the electors.

The parliamentary law that was approved by the centre right would not have got through if the citizens had been truly informed. It is a liberticidal law that has pushed aside the electors preventing them from a direct choice of candidate and it has weakened the winning coalition creating instability in the Senate.

It is the Mediaset electoral law, made to measure for its shareholders.
How many laws have been approved thanks to the media coverage of the former President of the Council? Do we want to remember the ‘ad personam’ laws, the ex Cirielli, the Pecorella? And to whom do we owe the weakening of the Justice System? Just think about it. We owe it to ‘ad personam’ news, to a gigantic conflict of interests, possible, among all democratic countries, only in Italy.

This is why, in the Government’s schedule, a serious set of rules regarding the conflict of interests must get the priority over all priorities. Italia dei Valori will fight for this, even with public initiatives that I will very soon be informing you about. In Italy, information is not free. It is headed up by private interests. Everyone knows that. But it certainly is not a good reason to continue to tolerate this situation.

Posted by Antonio Di Pietro in Politics