English
Italiano 2011: Del Gizzo Defeats Visco, Big Tobacco Continues to Be the Boss
In 2000, the Italian Minister of Finance Vicenzo Visco brought legal action against the ex-director general of the AAMS - the State Monopoly Agency - Ernesto Del Gizzo related to an interview published in the newspaper La Padania; the interview centered on the issue of tax evasion and smuggling of Philip Morris in Italy.
Today Del Gizzo was acquitted. In these eleven years, though his statements have been confirmed by sentences of the Court of Cassation, the Regional Court - TAR, the Council of State, the Constitutional Court and the European Union, the multinationals of cigarette production have taken over the entire national market and are continuing to steal.
An Old Story
In August 2000, Del Gizzo declared to La Padania that in 1995, when he was director of the State Monopolies - Monopoli di Stato - he transmitted to the Government an informative report on the missing tax revenue of Philip Morris in Italy: 60,591 billion Lire (30 billion euro) over a period of twenty years. He also reported a net profit every year of the multinational corporation of about 1.100 billion (650 million euro) coming from cigarette smuggling and earnings from products passed through the illegal market. Minister Visco's reaction was: “Your claims are seriously incautious”.
The debate in Parliament began in October 1995, and Visco and the new director of Revenue, Romano declared to the Finance Commissions of the Chamber and the Senate that the existence of a stable organisation of Philip Morris in Italy was questionable and problematic. With such authoritative statements, the financial administration did not provide the Milanese tributary judges of the first and second degree with evidence sufficient and suitable to confirm its existence.
In the same interview, Del Gizzo stated that Philip Morris, with the backing of some well-known parliamentary personages, had offered him 30 billion lire to convince him, in vain, to say that he had been mistaken on the responsibilities of Philip Morris, and of the public administration officials and politicians who seemed to have supported this company.
In 2001, the Cassation Court, with two sentences involving direct and indirect taxes, affirmed the incontestable existence of Italy’s tributary claim, raising to 120 thousand billion lire the total that Philip Morris would have to pay.
Foreseeing this inevitable legal ruling, the Government, with Massimo D’Alema, Vincenzo Visco and Oliviero Diliberto and signed by President Ciampi, on the 10th of March 2000, issued legislative decree no. 74 (outside the mandate of their delegation and therefore unconstitutional). In contrast to a fundamental principle of Italian law that states that no one can invoke ignorance of the penal law, the government decreed the non-punishability of the crime of fiscal evasion for those who found it difficult to interpret the laws that obligated them to pay taxes, and the multinational was limited (the Tremonti amnesty of 2003) to a payment of 400 billion lire instead of the 61 thousand billion assessed, recorded in the lists, still valid and still to be collected..
This initiative released from all penal liability all evaders and their accomplices. Consequently the G.I.P. Pfeiffer of Milan, who was about to indict all the international top officials of Philip Morris, in line with the request of the P.M. Raimondi, who was competent for this hot potato, had to dismiss the case, based on law no. 74. It was the one and only case of its application.
Del Gizzo, in these fourteen years that have passed since his premature forced retirement, has been able to see, more than silence, the disinterest of the institutional organs of political control and jurisprudence. Tax evasion and contraband, as he had denounced them, were confirmed by the sentences and by the actions of the European Union promoted before the European Court of Justice. There was a request for compensation of 100 billion dollars, reduced later, through political transaction, to 1 billion payable by the end of 2012. Meanwhile the responsibility of the political and administrative organs for the development of this evasive and elusive activity was excluded by the initiative of Minister Visco, supported by D’Alema, Diliberto and countersigned by President Ciampi.
The Lawsuit for Libel
On August 9th 2000, the Northern League - Lega Nord - newspaper La Padania published an interview with Del Gizzo on the entire business of tax evasion and contraband carried out starting in 1961 by the tobacco multinational Philip Morris; it offered a view of the backstage of Big Tobacco’s business of in Italy.
The next day a little article appeared in the newspaper Gazzetta del Mezzogiorno, that bore a brief statement of Del Gizzo, enucleating what had been written in La Padania the day before. The operation probably served to attribute the territorial competence to Bari. the newspaper’s place of edition and closer to the origins of Visco, instead of Monza where the edition had been made of a newspaper that is the expression of a political adversary that it was preferable not to ignore.
In 2005, the investigating magistrate – the GIP - , without hearing Del Gizzo, issued the penal ruling of condemnation to a fine of 4,660.00 euro. When this act was appealed in 2008, the monocratic magistrate confirmed the subsistence of the offence reducing the fine to 1,500.00 euro.
The Court of Appeals of Bari implicitly affirmed that, if Visco had wanted to safeguard his dignity offended in much more serious things than the proposal of 30 billion made to Del Gizzo on the 2nd of October 1996, he should have brought legal action against the contents of the La Padania interview and not against a simple and insufficient enucleation provided by the obliging newspaper of Bari.
The interview
Here are some excerpts on tax evasion and bribery taken from the interview published August 9, 2000 by the daily newspaper La Padania. Mr. Del Gizzo gives us a striking inside view of what goes on in the backstage of the business of Big Tobacco:
—Dr. Del Gizzo, the Head Public Prosecutor of the Tribunal of Naples, Cordova, in 1995, asked for trial proceedings to be started against the top officials of Philip Morris accused of smuggling and tax evasion.
"That's right. But then the fourth section of the Tribunal of Naples decided to declare itself incompetent on the issue. The hot potato was passed on to Milan. The investigation has been stopped for two years, now."
—Did you undergo pressure after that sensational exposure of yours?
"Shortly before I started the hearings in Naples, they tried to corrupt me. They wanted me to declare, during the first hearing on February 16th 1998, that I'd made a mistake. They offered me thirty billion lire (15 million euro) and promised to reinstate me in my position as managing director of the State Monopolies".
—You had been suspended by Vincenzo Visco (the Finance Minister in the Government of Romano Prodi).
"Yes, but in July 1997, I won an appeal that annulled the suspension. But for some reason that I don't know, in spite of the immediate effectiveness of the sentence, I wasn't reinstated".
—Who conducted that corruption attempt?
"They introduced themselves as messengers of Philip Morris. I can't say whether this is true or not. That's something someone else will have to look into.
—Was that the only attempt to try to convince you change your position?
"Minister Fantozzi (Finance Minister in the Berlusconi government) explained to me that if I continued, things wouldn't go well for me. Then his successor Visco offered me an appointment to the Council of State - Consiglio di Stato - if I'd change my attitude". "Philip Morris was interested in taking over the Italian market. It had already done this for many years, imposing its price policies and its marketing strategies; it had limited the competition of other brands; we had to fight its advertising, the diversity of prices on the market, the production costs and the taxation compared to standard criteria, its smuggling, the exoneration from paying taxes. I fought this; I proposed measures that could have restrained Philip Morris, but the Minister wouldn't listen to me. There were probably political reasons, I don't know… I have no evidence that indicates the contrary".
—Then you were removed from your job…
" I was dismissed from my position on February 28th 1997. The Council of Ministers adopted the decision at 12 o'clock, by 4.00 p.m. Scalfaro (then the President of the Republic) had already signed the decree, and by that evening, it was already all registered at the State Auditors' Office".
—After the sentence of the T.A.R.*, which was in your favor, what did you do?
"I asked to be reinstated. The Minister didn't answer. I denounced him for omission of official acts; the case is now before the Tribunal of Ministers, but I've heard nothing about it. In the meantime, Visco appealed to the Council of State against the sentence of the T.A.R. The Council of State didn't have the courage to express itself and appealed to the Constitutional Court, which in turn, on July 5th passed the ball back to the Council. The issue is blocked there".
* T.A.R. : Tribunale Amministrativo Regionale - Regional Administrative Court - It handles appeals, related to administrative acts, made by private citizens who consider themselves damaged in a legitimate interest.
—There were a lot of people who didn't do their duty?
«I don't know. Some people may not have done their duty, but that doesn't necessarily mean they were corrupted. I remember one central director who said to my secretary: "But does Del Gizzo really think he can fight Philip Morris?". A magistrate told me the same thing at the Tribunal of Ministers. I answered him: When you prosecute a crime, do you worry about whether the criminal is David or Goliath?
—What are you expecting now from this story?
«Nothing. I'm just waiting. Four years have passed; I've been given a little pension; I‘ve had no assignments. The latest nitwit Managing Director has been given jobs worth 400 to 500 million a year; for me nothing. I've been denied the chance to be received by the President of the nation that I served for 25 years as managing director and 15 years as financial advisor to the European Community. I've been pensioned off. If I had gone to the Council of State, where the smugglers wanted me, I could have continued my service until the age of 72; I'm 69 now, time is passing…. But then there is an important fact we should remember".
—What's that?
«Every year that passes, the statute of limitations wipes out one year of tax evasion. If we keep on waiting like this,…."
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