The information portal Jurno reports an interesting article on the now-aging affair of Agusta-Westland in India.
Let's talk about the large sum, over 50 million, paid in 2010 by AgustaWestland to win a contract of 556 million related to the sale of 12 helicopters in VIP configuration, intended for the transportation of members of the Government of Delhi. The figure would be managed by three intermediaries of various nationalities and partly paid to the then head of the Indian Air Force to change the requirements of the tender and allow Agusta to win it.
A second part of the maxitangente would have ended up in their pockets and a third, they say, returned to Italy and merged, after a whirlwind tour of the world between offshore companies and tax havens. In Italy, the verdict of the Court of Cassation is awaited on the matter, to which the Milan Public Prosecutor, the Revenue Agency and the Indian Ministry of Defense appealed after the acquittal of the appeal process-bis of the accused of international corruption: the former CEOs of Finmeccanica, Giuseppe Orsi, and of AgustaWestland, Bruno Spagnolini.
In the meantime, the investigation continues in India. Last December the CBI, the Indian federal investigative agency, obtained the extradition from Dubai of the most important of the three intermediaries involved in the deal, the British Christian Michel, who would have managed the return of part of the alleged bribe in Italy. Yesterday was the news that his request for provisional bail was refused by the judge in charge of the case.
A few days ago, India received and put into custody, again after extradition granted by the United Arab Emirates, another key person, the lobbyist Rajiv Saxena, accused of having taken care, together with Michel, of recycling the bribe through its financial companies in Dubai, Mauritius and other pleasant parts of the globe. Therefore, Minister Jaitley is not wrong when he says that no one can hide himself if he cheats on India, a country that is as proud and tenacious as its history clearly demonstrates. It should be noted that, in the meantime, the famous contract by 556 million has been canceled and the former Finmeccanica (now Leonardo) has been banned from Indian tenders for almost six years.
In this regard, a book by journalist Alessandro Da Rold has been released in recent days from the parallel world between industry and malfeasance Pecunia not olet, published by the Milanese publisher Chiarelettere.
The volume of Da Rold is dedicated in particular to the supposed brokerage activities carried out in Africa in favor of Agusta-Westland by an important fugitive mafia boss, Vito Roberto Palazzolo, the treasurer of Riina e Provenzano. But it places the African affair on the backbone of the management culture and the operating modes of the state group in those years, in which particularly stands the mega-bribe paid in India. Da Rold writes:
"The" Indian bribe "is, of the whole tormented Finmeccanica affair, the most extensive episode in terms of economic entity and consequences, more delicate from the point of view of international relations. However we can not forget that it is only the tip of an iceberg, which emerges in that "unitary criminal design" evoked by Rosario Cantelmo (one of the Neapolitan prosecutors who investigated Finmeccanica - nda) and demonstrated by the quantity and continuity of behavior to the limits of the lawfulness of which the first Italian defense company has proven over the years.
Beyond the individual responsibilities, which only justice can ascribe, the cause of these events probably lies in a cultural climate, unfortunately common to many companies of state matrix, where ethics are fragile and are considered almost a habit or a naivety. And who practices or defends it is seen as a madman or a "dangerous" troublemaker and then isolated from a system interested in promoting not so much its own evolution as its own survival. "
The last words refer to Francescomaria TuccilloNeapolitan lawyer and manager, in those years director of the Sub-Saharan Africa region of Finmeccanica. Among the objectives assigned to him was, on paper, to clean up the vast network of ethically controversial commercial intermediaries that the group used in African markets. So he did, even going so far as to denounce the presence of the fugitive Palazzolo - whom he met in a conference in Luanda, incredibly organized by our Embassy - "in places where it should not have been, to do things that he should not have done".
Instead of a commendation, his opposition to the dominant culture would have cost him a lot in personal and professional terms because, to quote Da Rold again, "in every opaque and closed new power system, it often happens that someone indicates the moon and everyone watches the finger".