Finally, Giuseppe Conte also broke his silence on the case of the removal of the president of the Region. He did so on the day of the first revelations that emerged from the over 700 pages of documents sent to the prosecutors by the Electoral Guarantee Board - among others, the hypothesis of the existence of "an intermediate scheme between the real financiers and the candidate". "I read the documents and the provision of the Guarantee Board and advised Alessandra Todde to sue for damages the signatories who by majority concluded for her removal", said yesterday the M5S leader and former prime minister.

The content of the transmitted documents has also convinced the governor's lawyers - Benedetto and Stefano Ballero, Giuseppe Macciotta, Priamo Siotto - who until now have been very reluctant to make public statements, to take an official position: «The statements of the president of the electoral guarantee board, Dr. Cucca, contained in the memorandum of 12 November 2024 filed by her in the proceedings, and recently recalled by the press in relation to the supposed existence of "an intermediate scheme", impose, in the intrinsic alteration of reality that characterizes them, a firm and absolute dissent».

Double lunge

Therefore: a double attack on the work of the Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari that produced the injunction order with a request to the Regional Council to adopt the measure of forfeiture of President Todde for irregularities in electoral expenses. Conte, to tell the truth, specifies that «we always trust in the judiciary», and that is why «I suggested to the governor to ask the civil court to rule to ascertain whether there are any profiles of guilt of the signatories of the Guarantee Panel, which is an administrative body, for having drawn a clearly illegitimate and unfounded conclusion, which has no basis in any provision of law».

The note

In a long note, the president's lawyers speak of "manifest illegitimacy of the provision", of "distorted reconstruction given by the panel with the final vote by a very narrow majority in order to an alleged desire to hide the origin of the funding, moreover, in no way received". In some way, Alessandra Todde's Sardinian lawyers anticipate the content of the appeal to the ordinary court that they will probably present next week, ahead of the deadline of February 3. "For absolute transparency, President Todde, both in the initial statement and in the clarifications provided at the beginning of last December, after having specified that she had not personally received any contribution and had not incurred any expense, produced, although not necessary, the full accounting of the expenses and contributions referred to the "Five Star Electoral Committee for the election of the president", thereby fundamentally denying the reconstruction given by the panel". The same panel, they add, «has moreover expressly recognized that the accounting data reported by President Todde were completely consistent with those already reported to the Court of Auditors by the “Five Star Electoral Committee”».

"Incompetence"

Then a clarification: «It is reiterated once again that the College was radically precluded from pronouncing the dismissal of the President of the Region, a prerogative of the exclusive competence of the Regional Council». The possibility of dismissal, «in any case expressly excluded in the case in question. In fact, both of the situations exhaustively provided for by the law as a cause of possible dismissal are inconceivable. Non-existence, moreover, implicitly recognized by the College itself, with the order that we are preparing to challenge before the Court of Cagliari». Nor, moreover, «can paragraph 7 of Article 15 of Law 515/93 configure a further generic and non-exhaustive cause of dismissal, as, with an inadmissible interpretation, the College has hypothesized by adding marginal formal violations, none of which entails dismissal». And therefore, «no doubt can therefore exist regarding the full legitimacy of President Alessandra Todde, her Executive and the Regional Council, to exercise their respective functions and it is trusted that the judicial authority will promptly remove any doubt in this regard, given the manifest illegitimacy of the contested provision».

Two tracks

The appeal will be filed next week, therefore. Once presented, Todde will report to the Chamber. On that occasion he will receive from the majority groups the invitation to undertake the commitment to raise the conflict of attributions with the State on the case of forfeiture, on which the Constitutional Court expresses itself directly. The safest way, according to many majority and opposition councilors, to guarantee the survival of the Council until the end of the legislature.

Roberto Murgia

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