Roberto Vannacci suspended from vice presidency of Patriots in European Parliament

Brussels – The saga of the “phantom” vice-presidency of the Patriots for Europe group to Roberto Vannacci, the Lega’s preferences champion MEP, may have finally come to a conclusion. However, if it is final, it will not please the Lega too much.

The former member of the Paratroopers Brigade “Folgore” “is no longer vice-president of the group” of the far-right “because his functions are for the moment suspended”: this is the lapidary statement of Jean-Paul Garraud, head of the Rassemblement national delegation to the EU Parliament, that seems to nail down both Vannacci and the federal secretary of his party, Matteo Salvini, who had precisely bet on Vannacci at the last European elections.

Not without a certain irony, the shingle on the Lega fell right on the fringes of an event organized by the Patriots for Europe group (one of the three into which the radical right is divided in Strasbourg) to defend the actions of the Lega deputy prime minister in the context of the “Open Arms case” recently reopened by the Palermo prosecutor’s office. 

The person involved said he knew nothing about it: “Until two days ago, I was listed as vice president, and no one told me anything. I have to see it on the website. Official documents count; I haven’t received anything official about it. Two days ago, on the site, I was listed as vice president, but now I don’t know,” Vannacci said to reporters. Adding, “This is a problem only for you; I don’t have to answer to the problems of the press.” Meanwhile, on the group’s website, his name no longer appears among the vice presidents.

His appointment had been put in doubt last July when the lepenists (with 30 deputies, are the majority of the group) claimed that they voted Vannacci “by mistake”. In blatant contrast to what was reconstructed by the Leghist Paolo Borchia delegation leader, according to whom, instead, the general was “elected by acclamation.” The mystery had remained unsolved until now and would seem to have finally been unravelled. But the last word has not been said yet.