The Mafia's Influence on Italian Politics
Current Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi
Many of Sicily’s largest postwar cities, the Mafia gradually infiltrated the building trades and pushed, shoved, and bought their way into most of the government-run agencies. A prime example of this is Palermo: Why is the city densely packed with ugly gray buildings and lacking lushes parks? Because the urban planning was undertaking by gangsters and criminals. It is said that the Mafia built almost half of the “new” Palermo, where Salvo Lima and Vito Ciancimino, the notoriously corrupt mayor and his successor, literally sold building permits directly to Mafia frontmen. The Mafia even had a stronghold over the local beef market. And a few of Sicily’s largest hotels were built (and are still run) by the Mafia.
The Catholic Church, a prominent figure in Italian culture, has not always taken a defiant stand against the matters of the Mafia. Some priests are now against the activities of organized crime, and at least one cleric has been murdered for doing so. However, in the 1960s, a Cardinal Archbishop of Palermo granted a statement that the Mafia had never existed, and that the Mafia myths were due to the creative musings of two Northerners, Giuseppe di Lampedusa and social activist Danilo Dolci who were attempting to defame Sicilians by implying that most of the residents of Sicily were secretive by nature, and that the Mafia is simply a figment of the imagination.
The sustained influence of the Italian Mafia probably has a great deal to do with the high rate of Italian unemployment, a widespread lack of confidence in the competence of law enforcement authorities, and distrust of the state. But the main reason organized crime prevails is probably due to the general secretiveness that is inherent in the South, where the common folk appear to be suspicious of even the most mundane and ordinary social factors. The Italian ethos is based on the realities of everyday life: “Italians presume that their elected leaders are thieves motivated by greed.” Businessmen assume that their employees will steal from them at any given moment. Labor unions assume that employers are out to do nothing but exploit the workers to no avail. Spouses assume that marital infidelity is inherent in human nature and even denote a particular word to the betrayed husband: “cornuto.”
To the Mafia, everything has a price. Entire economic sectors (transportation, hotels, banking, construction) are controlled by men in the mob. Most politicians, regardless of political orientation, can be purchased for a high price, and the same goes for managers or most larger banks and utilities. In Sicily, sex is an appropriate exchange for most public or semi-public jobs. For example, an unemployed young woman, who is nevertheless attractive and smart, is an easy target in a region with a perpetual 30% unemployment rate. Public contracts are assigned—or more likely sold—in exchange for bribes and kickbacks. All part of “The New Mafia,” money laundering is a way of life, and in such a climate, the pizzo (protection money) and narcotics trades are the main event.
Giulio Andreotti
In November 2002, a surprised Italy watched as its former prime minister, Giulio Andreotti, was sentenced to 24 years in prison for complicity in a 1979 Mafia-related murder. Now, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s right-hand senator, Marcello Dell’Utri, and his political party, Forza Italia, are under pressure to give a testimony regarding activities and cooperation with the Mafia. There have also been accusations that the Mafia had been in contact with members of Berlusconi’s Fininvest Company to negotiate the terms of their political support for Berlusconi’s election campaigning, and that Berlusconi invited Palermo mob boss, Stefano Bontade, to his villa outside Milan. It is believed that Bontade used to go to Berlusconi’s villa to visit his friend (and Mafioso) Vittorio Mangano.
Berlusconi himself was even questioned during Dell’Utri’s trial. He exercised his “right to silence,” refusing to reveal the source of 99 billion lira (about US $55.3 million) used to build his empire between 1978 and 1983. The money is suspected to have come from Mafia boss Bontade. The left of center “La Republlica” newspaper of Italy revealed that the Mafia chose to support and vote for Forza Italia (Berlusconi’s political party, named accordingly after the soccer team his company owns). Apparently, Forza Italian promised to soften jail conditions for Mafiosi and ease the confiscation of Mafia property, once in office. In exchange, the Mafia was to abandon its assault on the state-manifested in the 1992 and 1993 killings of two anti-Mafia magistrates—and fade into the shadows so as not to embarrass its new political ally.