26 March 2008

A clear justice policy

Right now, those of us in Italia dei Valori are not dealing with the issue, nor are we worried about the question of who will take charge of one Ministry rather than another. Veltroni has simply given an indication of what could be possibilities for me.

As regards the policies relating to justice, everyone can accept that Italia dei Valori has been formed from the experience of “Mani Pulite” to indicate a series of precise policies relating to justice, getting rid of the “ad personam” laws, increasing the financial resources relating to security and justice, reduction in the duration of trials, increase in the number of personnel in the justice system, increase in the police forces.
So, why should Italia dei Valori, that has such a clear justice policy, cause fear to anyone, even if it were to take on the role of Minister of Justice?
Berlusconi has already said that just the idea that I, with my past history, could go to the Ministry of Justice is horrifying for him. But I understand him. Once I discovered his activities, and today, if I were to be in that Ministry, as the first action I would deal with the shameful laws that he did so as to avoid his friends getting put on trial. I would pass a law that prevents convicted criminals to be candidates. And thus this would mean that his collaborators, the ones who paid the bribes to the Guardia di Finanza, in relation to checking the taxes of his companies, could not continue to be candidates to Parliamentary seats.
I would deal with this and I invite the citizens to think about and to tackle this way of doing politics for personal interests that this gentleman is carrying on.

I am worried that everything we are doing could be for some of our allies, certainly not for Veltroni, a motive to put obstacles in the path of Italia dei Valori. On the other hand, in the programme of the Democratic Party, we of Italia dei Valori have signed up to a very clear pact that the justice policy of the reformist model, that has Veltroni as the candidate for premier, is and must be something that is completely different from the “ad personam” laws that Berlusconi did.
We believe that action for Italia dei Valori’s justice policy should be if anything put on a pedestal and not squashed with senseless affirmations like those that people have said: “It’s best that Di Pietro doesn’t become Minister of Justice.” I haven’t asked for the position and someone should explain to me why ever should it not be possible.
Certainly not because I don’t know how the machinery of justice functions. Because if I look back to the Ministers who have had that role up until now, perhaps I have had the chance to have a bit more experience than they have had.

Exactly because of my activity as a prosecutor during “Mani Pulite”, it is the moment to say once and for all, loud and clear: the badness in our country is not and has not been the action of “Mani Pulite”, but the action of the bribe-giving, of the embezzlement, of the corruption, of illicit financing, of criminal politics that infested our governing class.
You don’t resolve problems by getting angry with the doctor who discovers an illness, but by attacking the illness and trying to make it weaker. This is what Italia dei Valori wants to do inside Parliament and in the Government in the next legislature.

Posted by Antonio Di Pietro in Justice