Italy senate approves tougher legislation against mafia vote-buying

Source:Xinhua Published: 2014-4-17 10:11:05

Italian senate passed a reform on Wednesday to toughen up legislation against mafia vote-buying, before upcoming European and local elections.

The draft reform was already licensed by the Lower House on April 3, and Senate's vote counted therefore as final approval. The provision passed with 191 votes in favor, 32 votes against, and 18 abstentions.

The reform provided a tougher version of the law, with a more detailed definition of the illegal conduct of mafia vote-buying and a wider spectrum of behaviors for which politicians and candidates might be suspected and probed.

The law was finally approved, however, amid high tensions and brawl in senate, with senators from anti-establishment Five Star Movement (M5S) especially struggling until the very last for making the new provision even stricter.

According to local media, the new text stated that vote-buying concerns all those "who accept the promise to bring votes in exchange of money, pledge of money or any other benefit", whereas the old law identified vote-buying only as an exchange between votes and money.

As such, experts deemed the old text outdated and inadequate to tackle mafia infiltration in politics, as it happens today.

The words 'any other benefit' were specifically introduced in the draft law under the insistence of anti-mafia magistrates and activists, who urged that current mafia vote-buying conduct is much more connected to an exchange of information and favors rather than money.

Italy is about to face European and local elections, both scheduled on May 25, with more than 4,000 city councils involved. The reform was thus seen as a crucial step in order to crack down on mafia infiltration in public life.

Between 1991 and 2014, according to aggregate figures based on Interior Ministry data, at least 248 city councils have been dissolved in Italy for mafia infiltration.

Posted in: Europe

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