Mayor of Rome Resigns Amid Scandal
Ignazio Marino, the Mayor of Rome, resigned from office on October 8 after another of a series of scandals, most recently regarding his credit card expenses. Marino, elected in 2013, allegedly used up to €20,000 of city funds for personal expenses. While Marino denies any misuse of public funds, this revelation marks his descent into the oft-frequented abyss of Italian political scandal, and may well have been the last straw for this surgeon-turned-politician.
After Marino’s election in 2013 on the center-left Democratic Party ticket, many Romans anticipated a great wave of change, especially in the areas of Marino’s platform, including political transparency, ecology, and tourism. Since Marino assumed office, however, he has been plagued by numerous accusations of scandal. In 2014, a major scandal called Mafia Capitale erupted under his watch in the Italian Mafia had infiltrated and corrupted the city administration under previous Mayor, Gianni Alemanno. Over 60 public officials were arrested in the wake of scandal.
A crisis ensued in Rome as an increasing number of Romans began to doubt Marino’s ability to manage the controversy. Marino himself questioned his decision to run for mayor when he stated during a 2014 press conference, “when I became mayor, I never imagined that I would find empty coffers, organized crime, and corruption.
From then on, many believe that Marino’s decisions have become increasingly questionable. He started by forbidding cars in downtown Rome, intensifying traffic elsewhere and angering commuters. Marino then reduced the space allocated on sidewalks for bars and cafés, angering bartenders. He also went after street vendors and the art forgers selling their paintings on Navone Plaza. Ultimately, Marino lost the support of the public transportation union (ATAC) and the waste disposal union (AMA) after several declarations emphasizing their negligence.
While attempting to make serious reforms within Rome, Marino has fallen out with almost all of its important figures. Even Pope Francis has accused Marino of “pretending to be a Catholic,” after the mayor celebrated a number of homosexual marriages. Matteo Renzi, the leader of the Democratic Party and the current Prime Minister, has denounced Marino’s ability to manage the city’s finances and went as far as to say in an open letter to the Roman newspaper Il Messaggero that “Rome does not deserve this.”
Many believe that, after facing one scandal after another, Marino had lost the support of his neighbors and the people of Rome. Indeed, many Romans’ hunger for change has been reflected in rising approval ratings for the Five Star Movement, an anti-establishment and anti-corruption party founded by former comedian Beppe Grillo in 2009.
Through it all, though, Marino firmly believed that he has fallen victim to a conspiracy. In an interview with La Stampa he stated that “if these bills [proving he had embezzled €20,000] had not arrived, one day or another they would have said that I have holes in my socks or they would have put cocaine in my pockets.”