Dear fellow citizens,
In the first part of my report on the newly appointed “ENVI” (Committee on the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety), I already described how the Italian Social Democrat Antonio Decaro managed to get himself elected as the new committee chairman with votes from Ursula von der Leyen's party (CDU/EPP). This alleged back-room deal between the Greens (Greens/EFA) and the CDU (EPP) has now resulted in two staunch supporters of the global elites' eco-socialist “Green Deal” sitting in key positions of the EU.
Antonio Decaro has been in politics for 20 years, is president of the Italian Association of Towns and Cities and was most recently the popular mayor of the southern Italian port city of Bari for 10 years.
As reported by the German newspaper ‘Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung‘ under the headline “Mafia suspicion in Apulia - The respectable Mr. Decaro”, Antonio Decaro is now suspected of being complicit.
In an anti-mafia operation this spring, 130 people from the local mafia clans of the Montani, Strisciuglio and Parisi were arrested. The Parisi control a large part of the drug trade in Bari and the surrounding area, while other “business areas” include illegal sports betting and extortion of protection money. Among those arrested were two former local politicians from the Bari metropolitan region. Their assets - real estate and business interests, sports cars and jewelry worth a total of over 15 million euros - were confiscated.
Ex-mayor and now EU committee chairman Antonio Decaro insisted that he had nothing to do with this network and that he had never negotiated anything with any mafioso.
Unfortunately, his former party colleague, the Apulian regional president Michele Emiliano and Decaro's predecessor as mayor of Bari, is now contradicting this statement. He himself, together with Antonio Decaro, had visited the sister of local mafia boss Antonio Capriati some years ago in order to dissuade him from his opposition to the establishment of a traffic-calmed zone. If this is true, Antonio Decaro would have lied in his previous denial. The question also arises as to what kind of quid pro quo would have to be offered to a mafia boss to change his mind about a construction project.
To make matters worse, another affair from Decaro's direct party circle came to light. As the alleged head of a clique of 60 predominantly left-wing local politicians who bought votes at a price of 50 euros each, even the mayor of Triggiano, a municipality in the Bari metropolitan region, is now in custody. His wife is also under investigation. The politician has already resigned from office and has also given up her Social Democratic party membership.
Of course, the presumption of innocence also applies to Antonio Decaro for the time being, but the legitimate question arises as to how wise it is to elect someone to chair one of the most important committees of the EU Parliament while his entire party field is currently drowning in an anti-mafia investigation.
With Ursula von der Leyen and Antonio Decaro in the EU Parliament, we now have two merciless advocates of the eco-socialist, ruinous and anti-citizen “Green Deal” in key positions, both of whom are also at the center of massive investigations. Von der Leyen for corruption and Antonio Decaro for involvement with the Italian mafia.
How can such people be seriously put forward as candidates for high political office and then even be elected there by a large majority?
The tough and comprehensive Italian anti-mafia laws of the 1980s and 1990s were introduced when it was recognized that organized crime had infiltrated politics on a large scale.
Perhaps we now need such laws at EU level too?
Kind regards,
Yours, Christine Anderson, MEP
