Photo: Ansa
Tommaso Manni
Twenty minutes, more for repeating the sentence than clarifying it. After clashes between FdI and Quirinale following quotes attributed by the newspaper ‘La Verità’ to Francesco Saverio Garofani, defense advisor to the President of the Republic, centered on alleged maneuvers to block Giorgia Meloni’s path, the Prime Minister called Sergio Mattarella. An early morning phone call – which was expected in Colle yesterday – served to arrange the meeting. Then, around 1 p.m., Meloni appeared at the Quirinale. The face-to-face, sources from Palazzo Chigi leaked shortly thereafter, served to “reaffirm the existing institutional harmony between Palazzo Chigi and the Quirinale, which has never failed since the inauguration of this Government and no one has doubted it”.
However, according to the Prime Minister, the reason for the dispute is not the relationship – institutional and personal – between the two. In fact, if the visit corresponds to the prime minister’s aim to “underline that there is no conflict”, Meloni did not give up expressing his “regrets” to the head of state for the “institutionally and politically inappropriate words spoken in a public context by council member Francesco Saverio Garofani”. After – in fact – inspiring him yesterday, the FdI leader repeated his defense to Mattarella regarding the actions of the group’s leader in the Galeazzo Bignami Room, which instead raised Colle’s “astonishment” for having given “a tribute to another attack on the Republican Presidency that was built almost ridiculously”. Meloni argued that the denial request formulated by Bignami “was not an attack on Quirinale, but rather a way to limit the problem to its true scope, also to protect Quirinale”, arguing that those who continue to believe that it is the person directly involved, namely Garofani, “who must clarify, to immediately close the matter”.
These words, never denied and actually confirmed in a press interview, are the ones that should, according to rumors circulating in parliament, have led to the defense adviser’s resignation. Meloni was actually going to ask Mattarella further, but Quirinale denied it. And they assured: “Carnations were never questioned for even a minute.” For Colle, however, after the meeting with the prime minister, the case was “closed”.
It is said that “the person who opens the case” is the one who closes it. The reference is to Galeazzo Bignami, who together with the head of the group in the Senate Lucio Malan, in the evening, laid out a note of peace in black and white, which corrected the aim a little further: after today’s conversation at the Quirinale, we read, “The Italian brothers consider the matter closed and do not intend to add anything. We renew our appreciation to President Mattarella and our appreciation for the institutional harmony between the Quirinale and Palazzo Chigi”. The frost, however, remains and is filtered through Garofani’s own words, who said he was “saddened” by the controversy that arose over a “chat between friends.” “What hurts most – added the secretary of the Supreme Defense Council – is the impression that it has been used to attack the president”. Mattarella, he said, “was very affectionate, he told me ‘don’t worry, don’t be angry'”.
Meanwhile, a new aspect emerged: Garofani’s words, which according to the newspaper Belpietro were the basis of the alleged ‘plan’ against Meloni, were contained in an email that came on Sunday afternoon to the editors of several newspapers, including La Verità. The reconstruction arrived in the inbox on Sunday at 12.24 pm, signed by Mario Rossi, from the address (email protected), and then ended, practically word for word, in an article published yesterday signed by the reporter, who is not on the list of professional journalists, Ignazio Mangrano. Il Giornale confirms this in an article signed this morning by Massimiliano Scafi, who writes that “the background written by director Maurizio Belpietro is accompanied by an article signed by Ignazio Mangrano that corresponds to the text sent two days earlier to various newspapers by a certain Mario Rossi”. Garofani “was in the restaurant and someone close to us heard everything”, but La Verità co-director Alessandro De Manzoni confirmed. Is there a recording? “It’s possible…”, he answered ‘One day as a sheep’. Meanwhile, the opposition continues to unite and defend the head of state. “They tried to attack the Quirinale. With the popularity of Mattarella – summarizes Walter Veltroni -, it was like hitting a wall”.
