Bettino Craxi
Encyclopedia
Benedetto Craxi (betˈtiːno ˈkraksi) (24 February 1934 – 19 January 2000) was an Italian politician, head of the Italian Socialist Party
from 1976 to 1993, the first socialist President of the Council of Ministers of Italy from 1983 to 1987.
cabinet), and had strong influence in Italian politics throughout the eighties; for some time, he was a close ally of two key figures of Christian Democracy
, Giulio Andreotti
and Arnaldo Forlani
, in a loose cross-party alliance often dubbed CAF (from the first letter of the surname Craxi-Andreotti-Forlani). Craxi had a firm grasp on a party previously troubled by factionalism, and tried to distance it from the communists and to bring it closer to Christian Democrats and other parties; his objective was to create an Italian version of European reformist socialist parties, like the German SPD
or the French Socialist Party
. The Italian Socialist Party reached its post-war apex when it increased its share of votes in the general election of 1987. However, the Italian Socialist Party never outgrew the much larger Italian Communist Party
, whose highly charismatic leader, Enrico Berlinguer
, was a fierce adversary of Craxi's policies throughout the years.
The main dynamic of Italian post-war politics was to find a way to keep the Italian Communist Party out of power. This led to the constant formation of political alliances between parties keen on keeping the Communists
at bay. Things were further complicated by the fact that many parties had internal currents that would have welcomed the Communists in the government coalition; in particular, within Christian Democracy, the largest party in Italy from 1945 to end of the First Republic ("Prima Repubblica").
A native of Milan
, Craxi was precocious and ascended to many levels of public office at very early ages. On 16 July 1976, Bettino Craxi was elected to the vacant Italian Socialist Party
chairman position, ending years of factional fighting within the party. Ironically, the "old guard" saw him as short-lived leader, allowing each faction time to regroup. However, he was able to hold on to power and implement his policies. In particular, he sought and managed to distance his party away from the communists
bringing it into an alliance with Christian Democracy
and other centrist parties, but maintaining a leftist and reformist profile.
During Craxi's tenure as Prime Minister, Italy became the fifth largest industrial nation and gained entry into the G7 Group of most industrialised nations. Inflation
was however often in the two-digits, and this was dealt with eliminating a wage-price increase link known as scala mobile ("escalator"); under this system, wages had been increased automatically depending on inflation. Abolishing the system did help reduce inflation, which was falling in other major countries as well, but inevitably increased strike
s in the long term, as workers had to bargain for better salaries. In any case, the victory of the "No" front in the referendum
called by the Italian Communist Party
was also a major victory for Craxi.
As a result of his spending policies, the Italian national debt skyrocketed during the Craxi era, passing 100% of the gross national product. The level of the Italian national debt is still well over 100% of the GDP.
(PSOE) during Francisco Franco
's dictatorship, and dramatist Jiři Pelikan, in the then Czechoslovakia
. A rare footage of Craxi trying to lay flowers at the tomb of Salvador Allende
has been unearthed from RAI
's (Radiotelevisione Italiana) archives. There is also proof that part of Craxi's illegally earned money was given in secret to leftist political opposition in Uruguay during the military dictatorship, to Solidarity in the period of Jaruzelski
rule in Poland, and to Yasser Arafat
and his Palestine Liberation Organization
because of Craxi's sympathy for the Palestinian
cause.
According to Giulio Andreotti
(the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy) and Abdel Rahman Shalgham
(Libya's Foreign Minister from 2000 until 2009), Craxi was the person who phoned Muammar al-Gaddafi
to warn him of the impending Operation El Dorado Canyon
air-strikes against Libya on April 15, 1986, permitting Gaddafi and his family to evacuate their residence in the Bab al-Azizia
compound moments before the bombs dropped. He later played a role in the 1987 seizure of power in Tunisia by Zine el Abidine Ben Ali
.
to extradite the hijackers of the cruise ship Achille Lauro
. After protracted negotiations, the hijackers were given safe passage to Egypt
by plane. Three United States Navy
F-14's forced the plane down to the United States Naval Air Facility (NAF) of Sigonella.
According the version of political circles in Washington, Craxi first gave the United States Forces permission to detain the terrorists, but he later reneged on the deal. He ordered Italian troops to surround the US Forces protecting the plane. This move was supposedly dictated both by security concerns about terrorists
targeting Italy if the United States had had it their way, and by the Italian tradition of diplomacy
with the Arab world
. Craxi's decisive character may have been relevant in this resolution.
Though the Americans demanded that the Italian authorities extradite Abu Abbas
of the PLO
, Craxi stood firm on the grounds that the crime had been perpetrated on Italian territory, on which the Italian Republic had sole jurisdiction. Craxi rejected the US extradition
order and let Abu Abbas
- chief of the hijackers, present on the plane - flee to Yugoslavia
; the four hijackers were later found guilty, and sentenced to prison
terms (in USA supposed to be relatively light, above all for the juvenile offender present between them) for hijacking and murder of an Jewish American citizen, Leon Klinghoffer
. Also Abbas was later convicted in Italy in absentia
, and eventually died, officially from natural cause, shortly after being taken prisoner by American forces in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion of Iraq
.
This episode earned Craxi an article in The Economist
titled "Europe's strong man" and a standing ovation in the Italian Senate
, which included his communist opponents.
was arrested by the police while taking a 7 million lira bribe from a cleaning service firm. Mario Chiesa sought Craxi's protection for nearly a month; but Craxi accused him of casting a shadow on the 'most honest party in Italy'.
Feeling emarginated and unjustly singled-out, Chiesa agreed to tell everything he knew to the prosecutors. His revelations brought half of Milan
Socialists and Industrialists under investigation. As a consequence, a team of Milanese judges began investigating specifically the party financing system. Milan was then a stronghold of the Italian Socialist Party
. At a time, even the city mayor, Paolo Pillitteri, Craxi's own brother-in-law, was investigated although he had immunity as a Member of Parliament.
In July 1992, Craxi finally realised the situation was serious, and that he himself was going to be hit by the unfolding scandal. He made an appeal before the Chamber of Deputies
in which he told his fellow deputies that everyone knew of the widespread irreguralities in the public financing of parties, accused them (the deputies) of hypocrisy and cowardice, and finally called for solidarity and protection from prosecution from all MPs to his party. However, his call was ignored.
Craxi took 5 more months to realise the full scale of the events, but some important MPs took even longer and by the time they knew, everything was done and they were wiped off the political map and thrown in jail.
Craxi was to receive the first of his many prosecution notices in December 1992. Many more followed next January and February until the Court of Milan explicitly asked Parliament the authorisation to bring Craxi to trial for bribery and corruption (at the time, in Italy MPs were immune from prosecution unless Parliament gave its authorisation). The authorisation was denied on 29 April 1993 after Craxi gave an emotional speech. However, the day wasn't over. He returned to his Roman
residence at the Raphael Hotel. A huge crowd assembled in front of the building and when Craxi finally went out, he was met with thousands of coins tossed at him. The outraged people intoned: "Bettino! Do you want even these?!".
, the magistrate who had provoked what Craxi called a "false Revolution" (i.e., his prosecution). At his side sat the secretary of the DC (Democrazia Cristiana, Italy's biggest party), Arnaldo Forlani
. Questions were asked about the so called 'maxi-bribe' ENIMONT which the PSI and DC had jointly received and democratically shared. Arnaldo Forlani
made the biggest mistake in his life, simply answering "what is a bribe?". On the other hand, Craxi defended himself in a bizarre way: ignoring the overall value of the rule of law. He accused himself, his own party and many more parties as well, of breaking the law on state funding of political parties, and finally defined the money effectively stolen in this way as "the cost of politics".
At the time of the ENIMONT affair, Craxi claimed that in a country where justice
always ran slow, his case was moving at extraordinary speed (which it in fact did). This was an attempt to depict the charges against him as politically motivated.
His explicit answers to all charges concerning Tangentopoli
(the corruption scandal) singled him out for illegalities which many other had committed.
In May 1994 he fled to Tunis in order to escape jail. His political career ended in less than 2 years. Italy's entire political class, including people like Andreotti and Forlani, was to follow suit soon.
The CAF (the Craxi-Andreotti-Forlani axis), which had made a pact to revive the Pentapartito (an alliance of five parties: DC, PSI, Italian Republican Party, Italian Liberal Party, Italian Democratic Socialist Party) of the 1980s and apply it to the 1990s, was doomed to be crushed by the popular vote as well as by the judges.
The set of anti-corruption investigations carried out by the Milan judges came to be collectively called Mani pulite
(clean hands). No party was spared, but in some parties corruption had become more endemic than elsewhere (either because of more opportunity or internal ethics). To this day, some people (especially those who were close to Craxi) argue that some parties (such as the Italian Communist Party
) were left untouched, while the leaders of then ruling coalition (and in particular Bettino Craxi) were wiped off the political map. This is not accurate however. For instance, the local communist leadership in Milan was jailed in its entirety.
The judges in Milan were put under scrutiny several times by different governments (especially Silvio Berlusconi
's first government in 1994), but no evidence of any misconduct was ever found. Furthermore, public opinion was much less concerned about foreign financing than about the misappropriation of their money by corrupt politicians.
In the end, the Socialist party went from 14% of the vote to a virtual nil. An ironic note was that the disgraced remnant of the party was excluded from Parliament by the minimum 4% threshold introduced by Bettino Craxi himself during one of his previous governments.
As mentioned before, during the "Mani pulite" period Craxi tried to use a daring defence tactic: he maintained that all parties needed and took money illegally, however they could get it, to finance their activities. His defence was therefore not to declare himself innocent, but everybody guilty. While this was basically truth, most citizens distrusted politicians, and Craxi's defence got no sympathy by the citizens and may have even served to enrage them further.
It should be noted, besides, that some bribes didn't go to the parties at all. They went to the personal wallet of the politician who happened to take them.
See also: Tangentopoli
(Italian for bribeville, used to indicate the corruption-based system that ruled Italy; Craxi is seen by many as its symbol)
, an expensive hotel
in Rome's centre, and had a large villa in Hammamet
, Tunisia
. As the Mani Pulite
investigations were to uncover in the nineties, personal corruption was endemic in Italian society; while many politicians, including Craxi, would justify corruption with the necessities of a democracy, political leaders at many levels enjoyed a lifestyle that should have been well out of their reach, while most parties continued having financial problems. Rino Formica, a prominent member of the Socialist Party in those years, wittily said that "the convent is poor, but the friars are rich".
Furthermore, Craxi's arrogant character won him many enemies; one of his most condemned actions was blaming corruption in the socialist party on treasurer Vincenzo Balzamo, just after the latter's death, in order to clear himself of any accusation. He also had controversial friends, such as Siad Barre
, dictator of Somalia
, Yasser Arafat
, leader of PLO, and Ben Ali
, dictator of Tunisia
. The latter provided protection to Craxi when he escaped from Italy.
Craxi's entourage was sharply defined by a critic as a "court of midgets and dancers", indicating the often ludicrous and immoral traits of a system based on personal acquaintance rather than merit. Among the friends of Craxi's to receive smaller and larger favours, Silvio Berlusconi
is perhaps the most known: he received many favours, especially regarding his media empire, and had a decree named after him ("Decreto Berlusconi") long before he entered politics. Other figures were Craxi's mistresses Ania Pieroni
, who owned a TV station in the Rome area, and Sandra Milo
, who had a skyrocketing career in the state TV conglomerate RAI
.
Craxi was also known for never apologising, as a matter of principle; whereas some did like this autocratic
trait in his successful years, most Italians expected an apology after the corrupt system had been exposed. Craxi never apologised, stating he had done nothing that everybody else had not been doing, and that he was being unjustly singled out and persecuted.
, and for a time he was probably Italy's most despised man. This was clearly visible when he, coming out of the roman Raphael Hotel, where he lived, received a salvo of coins that students coming from a PDS (left party) rally in Piazza Navona threw to him as a sign of their disgust. They started to jump and sing: <SOCIALIST is!>> (from a traditional stadium chant). Some of the students waved 1,000-lire
bills, singing Bettino, take these too! to the tune of Guantanamera
.
Craxi escaped the laws he had once contributed to make, by fleeing to Hammamet
in Tunisia
in 1994, and remained a fugitive there, protected by Ben Ali
's government. He repeatedly declared himself innocent, but never returned to Italy where he had been sentenced to 27 years in jail because of his corruption crimes (of these, 9 years and 8 months were upheld on appeal). He died on 19 January 2000, at the age of 65, from complications of diabetes.
Italian Socialist Party
The Italian Socialist Party was a socialist and later social-democratic political party in Italy founded in Genoa in 1892.Once the dominant leftist party in Italy, it was eclipsed in status by the Italian Communist Party following World War II...
from 1976 to 1993, the first socialist President of the Council of Ministers of Italy from 1983 to 1987.
Political career
Craxi led the 2nd longest-lived government of Italy during the republican era (after the 2nd Silvio BerlusconiSilvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi , also known as Il Cavaliere – from knighthood to the Order of Merit for Labour which he received in 1977 – is an Italian politician and businessman who served three terms as Prime Minister of Italy, from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006, and 2008 to 2011. Berlusconi is also the...
cabinet), and had strong influence in Italian politics throughout the eighties; for some time, he was a close ally of two key figures of Christian Democracy
Christian Democracy (Italy)
Christian Democracy was a Christian democratic party in Italy. It was founded in 1943 as the ideological successor of the historical Italian People's Party, which had the same symbol, a crossed shield ....
, Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
and Arnaldo Forlani
Arnaldo Forlani
This article is about the Italian legislator. For the similar name used as an alias by terrorist Ramzi Yousef for Philippine Airlines Flight 434, see Ramzi Yousef....
, in a loose cross-party alliance often dubbed CAF (from the first letter of the surname Craxi-Andreotti-Forlani). Craxi had a firm grasp on a party previously troubled by factionalism, and tried to distance it from the communists and to bring it closer to Christian Democrats and other parties; his objective was to create an Italian version of European reformist socialist parties, like the German SPD
Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany is a social-democratic political party in Germany...
or the French Socialist Party
Socialist Party (France)
The Socialist Party is a social-democratic political party in France and the largest party of the French centre-left. It is one of the two major contemporary political parties in France, along with the center-right Union for a Popular Movement...
. The Italian Socialist Party reached its post-war apex when it increased its share of votes in the general election of 1987. However, the Italian Socialist Party never outgrew the much larger Italian Communist Party
Italian Communist Party
The Italian Communist Party was a communist political party in Italy.The PCI was founded as Communist Party of Italy on 21 January 1921 in Livorno, by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party . Amadeo Bordiga and Antonio Gramsci led the split. Outlawed during the Fascist regime, the party played...
, whose highly charismatic leader, Enrico Berlinguer
Enrico Berlinguer
Enrico Berlinguer was an Italian politician; he was national secretary of the Italian Communist Party from 1972 until his death.-Early career:...
, was a fierce adversary of Craxi's policies throughout the years.
The main dynamic of Italian post-war politics was to find a way to keep the Italian Communist Party out of power. This led to the constant formation of political alliances between parties keen on keeping the Communists
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
at bay. Things were further complicated by the fact that many parties had internal currents that would have welcomed the Communists in the government coalition; in particular, within Christian Democracy, the largest party in Italy from 1945 to end of the First Republic ("Prima Repubblica").
A native of Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
, Craxi was precocious and ascended to many levels of public office at very early ages. On 16 July 1976, Bettino Craxi was elected to the vacant Italian Socialist Party
Italian Socialist Party
The Italian Socialist Party was a socialist and later social-democratic political party in Italy founded in Genoa in 1892.Once the dominant leftist party in Italy, it was eclipsed in status by the Italian Communist Party following World War II...
chairman position, ending years of factional fighting within the party. Ironically, the "old guard" saw him as short-lived leader, allowing each faction time to regroup. However, he was able to hold on to power and implement his policies. In particular, he sought and managed to distance his party away from the communists
Communism
Communism is a social, political and economic ideology that aims at the establishment of a classless, moneyless, revolutionary and stateless socialist society structured upon common ownership of the means of production...
bringing it into an alliance with Christian Democracy
Christian Democracy (Italy)
Christian Democracy was a Christian democratic party in Italy. It was founded in 1943 as the ideological successor of the historical Italian People's Party, which had the same symbol, a crossed shield ....
and other centrist parties, but maintaining a leftist and reformist profile.
During Craxi's tenure as Prime Minister, Italy became the fifth largest industrial nation and gained entry into the G7 Group of most industrialised nations. Inflation
Inflation
In economics, inflation is a rise in the general level of prices of goods and services in an economy over a period of time.When the general price level rises, each unit of currency buys fewer goods and services. Consequently, inflation also reflects an erosion in the purchasing power of money – a...
was however often in the two-digits, and this was dealt with eliminating a wage-price increase link known as scala mobile ("escalator"); under this system, wages had been increased automatically depending on inflation. Abolishing the system did help reduce inflation, which was falling in other major countries as well, but inevitably increased strike
Strike action
Strike action, also called labour strike, on strike, greve , or simply strike, is a work stoppage caused by the mass refusal of employees to work. A strike usually takes place in response to employee grievances. Strikes became important during the industrial revolution, when mass labour became...
s in the long term, as workers had to bargain for better salaries. In any case, the victory of the "No" front in the referendum
Referendum
A referendum is a direct vote in which an entire electorate is asked to either accept or reject a particular proposal. This may result in the adoption of a new constitution, a constitutional amendment, a law, the recall of an elected official or simply a specific government policy. It is a form of...
called by the Italian Communist Party
Italian Communist Party
The Italian Communist Party was a communist political party in Italy.The PCI was founded as Communist Party of Italy on 21 January 1921 in Livorno, by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party . Amadeo Bordiga and Antonio Gramsci led the split. Outlawed during the Fascist regime, the party played...
was also a major victory for Craxi.
As a result of his spending policies, the Italian national debt skyrocketed during the Craxi era, passing 100% of the gross national product. The level of the Italian national debt is still well over 100% of the GDP.
Foreign policy
In the international arena, he helped dissidents and Socialist Parties throughout the world organise and become independent. Notable recipients of his logistical help were the Spanish Socialist Workers' PartySpanish Socialist Workers' Party
The Spanish Socialist Workers' Party is a social-democratic political party in Spain. Its political position is Centre-left. The PSOE is the former ruling party of Spain, until beaten in the elections of November 2011 and the second oldest, exceeded only by the Partido Carlista, founded in...
(PSOE) during Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco y Bahamonde was a Spanish general, dictator and head of state of Spain from October 1936 , and de facto regent of the nominally restored Kingdom of Spain from 1947 until his death in November, 1975...
's dictatorship, and dramatist Jiři Pelikan, in the then Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...
. A rare footage of Craxi trying to lay flowers at the tomb of Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende
Salvador Allende Gossens was a Chilean physician and politician who is generally considered the first democratically elected Marxist to become president of a country in Latin America....
has been unearthed from RAI
RAI
RAI — Radiotelevisione italiana S.p.A. known until 1954 as Radio Audizioni Italiane, is the Italian state owned public service broadcaster controlled by the Ministry of Economic Development. Rai is the biggest television company in Italy...
's (Radiotelevisione Italiana) archives. There is also proof that part of Craxi's illegally earned money was given in secret to leftist political opposition in Uruguay during the military dictatorship, to Solidarity in the period of Jaruzelski
Wojciech Jaruzelski
Wojciech Witold Jaruzelski is a retired Polish military officer and Communist politician. He was the last Communist leader of Poland from 1981 to 1989, Prime Minister from 1981 to 1985 and the country's head of state from 1985 to 1990. He was also the last commander-in-chief of the Polish People's...
rule in Poland, and to Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
and his Palestine Liberation Organization
Palestine Liberation Organization
The Palestine Liberation Organization is a political and paramilitary organization which was created in 1964. It is recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" by the United Nations and over 100 states with which it holds diplomatic relations, and has enjoyed...
because of Craxi's sympathy for the Palestinian
Palestinian people
The Palestinian people, also referred to as Palestinians or Palestinian Arabs , are an Arabic-speaking people with origins in Palestine. Despite various wars and exoduses, roughly one third of the world's Palestinian population continues to reside in the area encompassing the West Bank, the Gaza...
cause.
According to Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti
Giulio Andreotti is an Italian politician of the now dissolved centrist Christian Democracy party. He served as the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy from 1972 to 1973, from 1976 to 1979 and from 1989 to 1992. He also served as Minister of the Interior , Defense Minister and Foreign Minister and he...
(the 42nd Prime Minister of Italy) and Abdel Rahman Shalgham
Abdel Rahman Shalgham
Abdel Rahman Shalgam is a Libyan politician. He was Foreign Minister of Libya from 2000 to 2009.From 1984 to 1995, before taking the office of Foreign Minister, Abdel Rahman Shalgham was Secretary of Libya's People's Bureau to Rome, Italy.From 1998 to 2000 he was appointed Secretary of Foreign...
(Libya's Foreign Minister from 2000 until 2009), Craxi was the person who phoned Muammar al-Gaddafi
Muammar al-Gaddafi
Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar Gaddafi or "September 1942" 20 October 2011), commonly known as Muammar Gaddafi or Colonel Gaddafi, was the official ruler of the Libyan Arab Republic from 1969 to 1977 and then the "Brother Leader" of the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya from 1977 to 2011.He seized power in a...
to warn him of the impending Operation El Dorado Canyon
Operation El Dorado Canyon
The 1986 United States bombing of Libya, code-named Operation El Dorado Canyon, comprised the joint United States Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps air-strikes against Libya on April 15, 1986. The attack was carried out in response to the 1986 Berlin discotheque bombing.-Origins:Shortly after his...
air-strikes against Libya on April 15, 1986, permitting Gaddafi and his family to evacuate their residence in the Bab al-Azizia
Bab al-Azizia
Bab al-Azizia was a military barracks and compound, situated in the southern suburbs of Tripoli, the capital of Libya. It served as the main base for the Libyan leader Colonel Muammar Gaddafi until its capture by anti-Gaddafi rebels on 23 August 2011, during the Battle of Tripoli in the Libyan...
compound moments before the bombs dropped. He later played a role in the 1987 seizure of power in Tunisia by Zine el Abidine Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali is a Tunisian political figure who was the second President of Tunisia from 1987 to 2011. Ben Ali was appointed Prime Minister in October 1987, and he assumed the Presidency on 7 November 1987 in a bloodless coup d'état that ousted President Habib Bourguiba, who was...
.
The Sigonella crisis
Internationally, Craxi is perhaps best remembered for an incident in October 1985, when he refused the request of US President Ronald ReaganRonald Reagan
Ronald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States , the 33rd Governor of California and, prior to that, a radio, film and television actor....
to extradite the hijackers of the cruise ship Achille Lauro
MS Achille Lauro
MS Achille Lauro was a cruise ship based in Naples, Italy. Built between 1939 and 1947 as MS Willem Ruys, a passenger liner for the Rotterdamsche Lloyd. It is most remembered for its 1985 hijacking...
. After protracted negotiations, the hijackers were given safe passage to Egypt
Egypt
Egypt , officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, Arabic: , is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Southwest Asia. Egypt is thus a transcontinental country, and a major power in Africa, the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and the Muslim world...
by plane. Three United States Navy
United States Navy
The United States Navy is the naval warfare service branch of the United States Armed Forces and one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. The U.S. Navy is the largest in the world; its battle fleet tonnage is greater than that of the next 13 largest navies combined. The U.S...
F-14's forced the plane down to the United States Naval Air Facility (NAF) of Sigonella.
According the version of political circles in Washington, Craxi first gave the United States Forces permission to detain the terrorists, but he later reneged on the deal. He ordered Italian troops to surround the US Forces protecting the plane. This move was supposedly dictated both by security concerns about terrorists
Terrorism
Terrorism is the systematic use of terror, especially as a means of coercion. In the international community, however, terrorism has no universally agreed, legally binding, criminal law definition...
targeting Italy if the United States had had it their way, and by the Italian tradition of diplomacy
Diplomacy
Diplomacy is the art and practice of conducting negotiations between representatives of groups or states...
with the Arab world
Arab world
The Arab world refers to Arabic-speaking states, territories and populations in North Africa, Western Asia and elsewhere.The standard definition of the Arab world comprises the 22 states and territories of the Arab League stretching from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Arabian Sea in the...
. Craxi's decisive character may have been relevant in this resolution.
Though the Americans demanded that the Italian authorities extradite Abu Abbas
Abu Abbas
Muhammad Zaidan also known as Abū ‘Abbās or Muhammad ‘Abbās, was the founder and leader of paramilitary group the Palestine Liberation Front .- Political background :...
of the PLO
Palestine Liberation Organization
The Palestine Liberation Organization is a political and paramilitary organization which was created in 1964. It is recognized as the "sole legitimate representative of the Palestinian people" by the United Nations and over 100 states with which it holds diplomatic relations, and has enjoyed...
, Craxi stood firm on the grounds that the crime had been perpetrated on Italian territory, on which the Italian Republic had sole jurisdiction. Craxi rejected the US extradition
Extradition
Extradition is the official process whereby one nation or state surrenders a suspected or convicted criminal to another nation or state. Between nation states, extradition is regulated by treaties...
order and let Abu Abbas
Abu Abbas
Muhammad Zaidan also known as Abū ‘Abbās or Muhammad ‘Abbās, was the founder and leader of paramilitary group the Palestine Liberation Front .- Political background :...
- chief of the hijackers, present on the plane - flee to Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
; the four hijackers were later found guilty, and sentenced to prison
Prison
A prison is a place in which people are physically confined and, usually, deprived of a range of personal freedoms. Imprisonment or incarceration is a legal penalty that may be imposed by the state for the commission of a crime...
terms (in USA supposed to be relatively light, above all for the juvenile offender present between them) for hijacking and murder of an Jewish American citizen, Leon Klinghoffer
Leon Klinghoffer
Leon Klinghoffer was a disabled American appliance manufacturer who was murdered and thrown overboard by Palestinian terrorists in the hijacking of the cruise ship Achille Lauro in 1985.-Hijacking and murder:...
. Also Abbas was later convicted in Italy in absentia
In absentia
In absentia is Latin for "in the absence". In legal use, it usually means a trial at which the defendant is not physically present. The phrase is not ordinarily a mere observation, but suggests recognition of violation to a defendant's right to be present in court proceedings in a criminal trial.In...
, and eventually died, officially from natural cause, shortly after being taken prisoner by American forces in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion of Iraq
2003 invasion of Iraq
The 2003 invasion of Iraq , was the start of the conflict known as the Iraq War, or Operation Iraqi Freedom, in which a combined force of troops from the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia and Poland invaded Iraq and toppled the regime of Saddam Hussein in 21 days of major combat operations...
.
This episode earned Craxi an article in The Economist
The Economist
The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
titled "Europe's strong man" and a standing ovation in the Italian Senate
Italian Senate
The Senate of the Republic is the upper house of the Italian Parliament. It was established in its current form on 8 May 1948, but previously existed during the Kingdom of Italy as Senato del Regno , itself a continuation of the Senato Subalpino of Sardinia-Piedmont established on 8 May 1848...
, which included his communist opponents.
Involvement in "Mani Pulite" scandal
The last main turning point of Craxi's career began in 1992. In February, Socialist MP Mario ChiesaMario Chiesa
Mario Chiesa was an Italian politician and member of the Italian Socialist Party. In 1992 Chiesa was arrested on charges of corruption, leading to the mani pulite trials, and eventually to a restructuring of Italian politics. In 2009 he was arrested again, under charges related to waste treatment...
was arrested by the police while taking a 7 million lira bribe from a cleaning service firm. Mario Chiesa sought Craxi's protection for nearly a month; but Craxi accused him of casting a shadow on the 'most honest party in Italy'.
Feeling emarginated and unjustly singled-out, Chiesa agreed to tell everything he knew to the prosecutors. His revelations brought half of Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...
Socialists and Industrialists under investigation. As a consequence, a team of Milanese judges began investigating specifically the party financing system. Milan was then a stronghold of the Italian Socialist Party
Italian Socialist Party
The Italian Socialist Party was a socialist and later social-democratic political party in Italy founded in Genoa in 1892.Once the dominant leftist party in Italy, it was eclipsed in status by the Italian Communist Party following World War II...
. At a time, even the city mayor, Paolo Pillitteri, Craxi's own brother-in-law, was investigated although he had immunity as a Member of Parliament.
In July 1992, Craxi finally realised the situation was serious, and that he himself was going to be hit by the unfolding scandal. He made an appeal before the Chamber of Deputies
Chamber of Deputies
Chamber of deputies is the name given to a legislative body such as the lower house of a bicameral legislature, or can refer to a unicameral legislature.-Description:...
in which he told his fellow deputies that everyone knew of the widespread irreguralities in the public financing of parties, accused them (the deputies) of hypocrisy and cowardice, and finally called for solidarity and protection from prosecution from all MPs to his party. However, his call was ignored.
Craxi took 5 more months to realise the full scale of the events, but some important MPs took even longer and by the time they knew, everything was done and they were wiped off the political map and thrown in jail.
Craxi was to receive the first of his many prosecution notices in December 1992. Many more followed next January and February until the Court of Milan explicitly asked Parliament the authorisation to bring Craxi to trial for bribery and corruption (at the time, in Italy MPs were immune from prosecution unless Parliament gave its authorisation). The authorisation was denied on 29 April 1993 after Craxi gave an emotional speech. However, the day wasn't over. He returned to his Roman
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
residence at the Raphael Hotel. A huge crowd assembled in front of the building and when Craxi finally went out, he was met with thousands of coins tossed at him. The outraged people intoned: "Bettino! Do you want even these?!".
Facing the judges
In December 1993, after finally allowing to be investigated, Craxi was called to testify in front of Justice Antonio Di PietroAntonio Di Pietro
Antonio Di Pietro is an Italian politician. He was a Member of the European Parliament, an Italian Senator, and Minister of the Prodi Government...
, the magistrate who had provoked what Craxi called a "false Revolution" (i.e., his prosecution). At his side sat the secretary of the DC (Democrazia Cristiana, Italy's biggest party), Arnaldo Forlani
Arnaldo Forlani
This article is about the Italian legislator. For the similar name used as an alias by terrorist Ramzi Yousef for Philippine Airlines Flight 434, see Ramzi Yousef....
. Questions were asked about the so called 'maxi-bribe' ENIMONT which the PSI and DC had jointly received and democratically shared. Arnaldo Forlani
Arnaldo Forlani
This article is about the Italian legislator. For the similar name used as an alias by terrorist Ramzi Yousef for Philippine Airlines Flight 434, see Ramzi Yousef....
made the biggest mistake in his life, simply answering "what is a bribe?". On the other hand, Craxi defended himself in a bizarre way: ignoring the overall value of the rule of law. He accused himself, his own party and many more parties as well, of breaking the law on state funding of political parties, and finally defined the money effectively stolen in this way as "the cost of politics".
At the time of the ENIMONT affair, Craxi claimed that in a country where justice
Justice
Justice is a concept of moral rightness based on ethics, rationality, law, natural law, religion, or equity, along with the punishment of the breach of said ethics; justice is the act of being just and/or fair.-Concept of justice:...
always ran slow, his case was moving at extraordinary speed (which it in fact did). This was an attempt to depict the charges against him as politically motivated.
His explicit answers to all charges concerning Tangentopoli
Tangentopoli
Tangentopoli is a term which was coined to describe pervasive corruption in the Italian political system exposed in the 1992-6 Mani Pulite investigations, as well as the resulting scandal, which led to the collapse of the hitherto dominant Christian Democracy party and its allies.-Popular distrust...
(the corruption scandal) singled him out for illegalities which many other had committed.
In May 1994 he fled to Tunis in order to escape jail. His political career ended in less than 2 years. Italy's entire political class, including people like Andreotti and Forlani, was to follow suit soon.
The CAF (the Craxi-Andreotti-Forlani axis), which had made a pact to revive the Pentapartito (an alliance of five parties: DC, PSI, Italian Republican Party, Italian Liberal Party, Italian Democratic Socialist Party) of the 1980s and apply it to the 1990s, was doomed to be crushed by the popular vote as well as by the judges.
The set of anti-corruption investigations carried out by the Milan judges came to be collectively called Mani pulite
Mani pulite
Mani pulite was a nationwide Italian judicial investigation into political corruption held in the 1990s. Mani pulite led to the demise of the so-called First Republic, resulting in the disappearance of many parties. Some politicians and industry leaders committed suicide after their crimes were...
(clean hands). No party was spared, but in some parties corruption had become more endemic than elsewhere (either because of more opportunity or internal ethics). To this day, some people (especially those who were close to Craxi) argue that some parties (such as the Italian Communist Party
Italian Communist Party
The Italian Communist Party was a communist political party in Italy.The PCI was founded as Communist Party of Italy on 21 January 1921 in Livorno, by seceding from the Italian Socialist Party . Amadeo Bordiga and Antonio Gramsci led the split. Outlawed during the Fascist regime, the party played...
) were left untouched, while the leaders of then ruling coalition (and in particular Bettino Craxi) were wiped off the political map. This is not accurate however. For instance, the local communist leadership in Milan was jailed in its entirety.
The judges in Milan were put under scrutiny several times by different governments (especially Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi , also known as Il Cavaliere – from knighthood to the Order of Merit for Labour which he received in 1977 – is an Italian politician and businessman who served three terms as Prime Minister of Italy, from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006, and 2008 to 2011. Berlusconi is also the...
's first government in 1994), but no evidence of any misconduct was ever found. Furthermore, public opinion was much less concerned about foreign financing than about the misappropriation of their money by corrupt politicians.
In the end, the Socialist party went from 14% of the vote to a virtual nil. An ironic note was that the disgraced remnant of the party was excluded from Parliament by the minimum 4% threshold introduced by Bettino Craxi himself during one of his previous governments.
As mentioned before, during the "Mani pulite" period Craxi tried to use a daring defence tactic: he maintained that all parties needed and took money illegally, however they could get it, to finance their activities. His defence was therefore not to declare himself innocent, but everybody guilty. While this was basically truth, most citizens distrusted politicians, and Craxi's defence got no sympathy by the citizens and may have even served to enrage them further.
It should be noted, besides, that some bribes didn't go to the parties at all. They went to the personal wallet of the politician who happened to take them.
See also: Tangentopoli
Tangentopoli
Tangentopoli is a term which was coined to describe pervasive corruption in the Italian political system exposed in the 1992-6 Mani Pulite investigations, as well as the resulting scandal, which led to the collapse of the hitherto dominant Christian Democracy party and its allies.-Popular distrust...
(Italian for bribeville, used to indicate the corruption-based system that ruled Italy; Craxi is seen by many as its symbol)
"Midgets and dancers"
Craxi's lifestyle was perceived to be inappropriate for the secretary of a party with so many alleged financial problems: he lived in the RaphaelRaphael
Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino , better known simply as Raphael, was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. His work is admired for its clarity of form and ease of composition and for its visual achievement of the Neoplatonic ideal of human grandeur...
, an expensive hotel
Hotel
A hotel is an establishment that provides paid lodging on a short-term basis. The provision of basic accommodation, in times past, consisting only of a room with a bed, a cupboard, a small table and a washstand has largely been replaced by rooms with modern facilities, including en-suite bathrooms...
in Rome's centre, and had a large villa in Hammamet
Hammamet
Hammamet is a town in Tunisia. Due to its beaches it is a popular destination for swimming and water sports. It was the first tourist destination in Tunisia...
, Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
. As the Mani Pulite
Mani pulite
Mani pulite was a nationwide Italian judicial investigation into political corruption held in the 1990s. Mani pulite led to the demise of the so-called First Republic, resulting in the disappearance of many parties. Some politicians and industry leaders committed suicide after their crimes were...
investigations were to uncover in the nineties, personal corruption was endemic in Italian society; while many politicians, including Craxi, would justify corruption with the necessities of a democracy, political leaders at many levels enjoyed a lifestyle that should have been well out of their reach, while most parties continued having financial problems. Rino Formica, a prominent member of the Socialist Party in those years, wittily said that "the convent is poor, but the friars are rich".
Furthermore, Craxi's arrogant character won him many enemies; one of his most condemned actions was blaming corruption in the socialist party on treasurer Vincenzo Balzamo, just after the latter's death, in order to clear himself of any accusation. He also had controversial friends, such as Siad Barre
Siad Barre
Mohamed Siad Barre was the military dictator and President of the Somali Democratic Republic from 1969 to 1991. During his rule, he styled himself as Jaalle Siyaad ....
, dictator of Somalia
Somalia
Somalia , officially the Somali Republic and formerly known as the Somali Democratic Republic under Socialist rule, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. Since the outbreak of the Somali Civil War in 1991 there has been no central government control over most of the country's territory...
, Yasser Arafat
Yasser Arafat
Mohammed Yasser Abdel Rahman Abdel Raouf Arafat al-Qudwa al-Husseini , popularly known as Yasser Arafat or by his kunya Abu Ammar , was a Palestinian leader and a Laureate of the Nobel Prize. He was Chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization , President of the Palestinian National Authority...
, leader of PLO, and Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali is a Tunisian political figure who was the second President of Tunisia from 1987 to 2011. Ben Ali was appointed Prime Minister in October 1987, and he assumed the Presidency on 7 November 1987 in a bloodless coup d'état that ousted President Habib Bourguiba, who was...
, dictator of Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
. The latter provided protection to Craxi when he escaped from Italy.
Craxi's entourage was sharply defined by a critic as a "court of midgets and dancers", indicating the often ludicrous and immoral traits of a system based on personal acquaintance rather than merit. Among the friends of Craxi's to receive smaller and larger favours, Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi
Silvio Berlusconi , also known as Il Cavaliere – from knighthood to the Order of Merit for Labour which he received in 1977 – is an Italian politician and businessman who served three terms as Prime Minister of Italy, from 1994 to 1995, 2001 to 2006, and 2008 to 2011. Berlusconi is also the...
is perhaps the most known: he received many favours, especially regarding his media empire, and had a decree named after him ("Decreto Berlusconi") long before he entered politics. Other figures were Craxi's mistresses Ania Pieroni
Ania Pieroni
Ania Pieroni is an Italian actress from the late 1970s and early 1980s.- Early life :Ania Pieroni was born in 1957 in Rome to a middle-class family. Her paternal grandfather was the mayor of Pescara, while her maternal grandfather was a German architect. Her father was a Knight of Malta, a pilot...
, who owned a TV station in the Rome area, and Sandra Milo
Sandra Milo
Sandra Milo is an Italian actress. She is perhaps best known for her roles in Federico Fellini's 8½ and Juliet of the Spirits, winning a Silver Ribbon best supporting actress award for each film.-Career:...
, who had a skyrocketing career in the state TV conglomerate RAI
RAI
RAI — Radiotelevisione italiana S.p.A. known until 1954 as Radio Audizioni Italiane, is the Italian state owned public service broadcaster controlled by the Ministry of Economic Development. Rai is the biggest television company in Italy...
.
Craxi was also known for never apologising, as a matter of principle; whereas some did like this autocratic
Autocracy
An autocracy is a form of government in which one person is the supreme power within the state. It is derived from the Greek : and , and may be translated as "one who rules by himself". It is distinct from oligarchy and democracy...
trait in his successful years, most Italians expected an apology after the corrupt system had been exposed. Craxi never apologised, stating he had done nothing that everybody else had not been doing, and that he was being unjustly singled out and persecuted.
Escape to Tunisia
All this resulted in him being considered the symbol of political corruptionPolitical corruption
Political corruption is the use of legislated powers by government officials for illegitimate private gain. Misuse of government power for other purposes, such as repression of political opponents and general police brutality, is not considered political corruption. Neither are illegal acts by...
, and for a time he was probably Italy's most despised man. This was clearly visible when he, coming out of the roman Raphael Hotel, where he lived, received a salvo of coins that students coming from a PDS (left party) rally in Piazza Navona threw to him as a sign of their disgust. They started to jump and sing: <
Italian lira
The lira was the currency of Italy between 1861 and 2002. Between 1999 and 2002, the Italian lira was officially a “national subunit” of the euro...
bills, singing Bettino, take these too! to the tune of Guantanamera
Guantanamera
"Guantanamera" is perhaps the best known Cuban song and that country's most noted patriotic song.-Music:The music for the song is sometimes attributed to José Fernández Diaz, known as Joseíto Fernández, who claimed to have written it at various dates , and who used it regularly in one of his radio...
.
Craxi escaped the laws he had once contributed to make, by fleeing to Hammamet
Hammamet
Hammamet is a town in Tunisia. Due to its beaches it is a popular destination for swimming and water sports. It was the first tourist destination in Tunisia...
in Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
in 1994, and remained a fugitive there, protected by Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali
Zine El Abidine Ben Ali is a Tunisian political figure who was the second President of Tunisia from 1987 to 2011. Ben Ali was appointed Prime Minister in October 1987, and he assumed the Presidency on 7 November 1987 in a bloodless coup d'état that ousted President Habib Bourguiba, who was...
's government. He repeatedly declared himself innocent, but never returned to Italy where he had been sentenced to 27 years in jail because of his corruption crimes (of these, 9 years and 8 months were upheld on appeal). He died on 19 January 2000, at the age of 65, from complications of diabetes.
Quotes by Bettino Craxi
- La Maxitangente fu solo una maxiballa ("The maxibribe was just maxibullshit"); uttered in court, about a (then alleged) huge bribe paid to many parties and politicians by Raul Gardini. Craxi was later convicted.
- La mia libertà equivale alla mia vita ("My freedom is my life"), epitaphEpitaphAn epitaph is a short text honoring a deceased person, strictly speaking that is inscribed on their tombstone or plaque, but also used figuratively. Some are specified by the dead person beforehand, others chosen by those responsible for the burial...
on his tomb.