Rome. Former ‘Mani Pulite’ public prosecutor Antonio Di Pietro has put himself forward as a candidate for the High Council of the Judiciary (CSM), and whilst some in the centre-right might well think ‘why not’, for Forza Italia the very idea of that name in that forum takes on the feel of a dystopian film. There is clear opposition to this prospect, as Parliament prepares to vote in a joint session on the lay members of the High Council of the Judiciary. “But I would like to clear up a misunderstanding: for me, this is not a personal matter,” says Stefania Craxi, Forza Italia’s group leader in the Senate: “If it had been a personal matter, I would have kept quiet.” Stefania says this despite the fact that the Craxi family went through that period in a truly dramatic way, both in Italy and in Hammamet. “I speak as group leader and in the name of a political culture and a concept of justice rooted in the rule of law, in the concept of a fair trial before an impartial third-party judge, and in the presumption of innocence. I have always believed that a trial should take place in the courtroom and not in the media, that pre-trial detention should be the exception, and I believe that the magistrate fulfils a most noble mission – a mission that certainly is not synonymous with society’s quest for moral redemption. Di Pietro, with his history and his actions, is instead the symbol of an era in which the balance of powers was disrupted and in which justice became so politicised as to decide who should remain in the political arena and who should disappear. An entire ruling class was swept away’. With this wound, says Stefania Craxi, the country “has not yet fully come to terms with it”, and “being elected as a member of the CSM means taking on a role in which seriousness, selfless action, legal expertise and the ability to represent even those who think differently must prevail. In short, Antonio Di Pietro’s self-nomination conflicts with the idea of justice held by Silvio Berlusconi and still espoused by this party.” Di Pietro voted ‘Yes’ in the referendum on justice and campaigned at the forefront. Perhaps some on the right think he has engaged in self-criticism? “Di Pietro is the symbol of an era of terror, in which the very concept of the impartial and independent judge was undermined, and he is partly responsible for the descent into the maelstrom of punitive populism. If the former public prosecutor were truly engaging in self-criticism, he would have to admit that ‘Mani Pulite’ was a mistake: the system did indeed need reforming, yes, but not destroying through legal means. Instead, that is precisely what was done, with the result that we have found ourselves living in a democracy under guardianship, witnessing the rise of anti-politics and the drift of a public administration that is afraid to make decisions.” Precisely because she makes her ‘no’ to Di Pietro a political rather than a personal issue, Stefania Craxi does not wish to dwell on memories, nor does she have any interest in publicly retracing the stages of events in which, for her, the personal and the political became inextricably intertwined: “Politics is not conducted out of resentment or bitterness,” she says. And yet, for the leader of the centre-right group in the Senate, the former ‘Mani Pulite’ public prosecutor “brought down a political system: that is how I judge him, and that is why, as a party, we oppose him. As for the rest, history will tell us who Bettino Craxi was for this country, and who Antonio Di Pietro was.”
