Tourism Minister Daniela Santanchè's
legal team on Tuesday asked preliminary hearings judge (GUP)
Tiziana Gueli to postpone a hearing set for Wednesday over the
alleged aggravated fraud against INPS social security and
pensions agency on the lay-off fund during the COVID period in
the Visibilia case after the minister changed one of her
attorneys.
Santanchè is replacing Salvatore Sanzo with Salvatore Pino, who
asked the judge on Tuesday to be allowed more time to study the
case.
Judge Gueli is set to rule Wednesday on the request to postpone
a key hearing to decide whether Santanchè will be indicted in
the case.
The tourism minister has said she will step aside in the event
of an indictment.
The GUP is expected to rule in favour of Pino's request to
postpone the preliminary hearing to study the court documents
and set another date also because Santanchè's other attorney
Nicolò Pelanda won't be able to attend, judicial sources said
Tuesday.
The judge was however not expected to rule on whether to indict
Santanchè and the other defendants at the hearing set on
Wednesday after the supreme Cassation Court ruled that the trial
would remain in Milan and not be moved to Rome, as requested by
defence attorneys, which left the preliminary phase open for
longer.
In the judicial proceedings, the word will then go to
prosecutors Marina Gravina and Luigi Luzi and subsequently to
attorney Aldo Tagliene, who represents INPS, and the defence
attorneys.
At least two additional preliminary hearings are expected before
a decision on the indictment is made, according to court
sources.
Meanwhile the GUP, who has been assigned to another office, will
remain in her role until March 31 and could remain in office
longer to complete the preliminary hearings phase which would
otherwise need to start from scratch in front of another
magistrate, the judicial sources said.
Santanchè and two other people, including her life partner
Dimitri Kunz, and two companies are accused of aggravated fraud
against INPS for drawing on COVID redundancy funds for staff at
her Visibilia group while they were in fact allegedly working.
Meanwhile Galeazzo Bignami, the Lower House whip of Prime
Minister Giorgia Meloni's Brothers of Italy (FdI) party of which
Santanchè is a leding member, said on Tuesday that an indictment
would lead the minister to resign from her post.
"I don't know if tomorrow's hearing will be confirmed but little
will change", he told Skytg24.
"We believe, as the minister has told the House, that an
indictment would lead to the acknowledgement that it is
necessary to leave the post not because she is governing tourism
badly - on the contrary we have absolutely awarding data - but
to grand her the possibility of defending herself in the most
serene way possible", he said
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