ROME – Battle in the Senate, sparks between Enrico Borghi, group leader of Italia viva, and the Minister of Reforms Elisabetta Casellati. The outcome: session suspended for ten minutes by the rotating president Mariolina Castellone, M5S.
While Borghi speaks, stigmatizing Casellati’s use of the expression “eliminate” in reference to senators for life, as part of the examination of the legislative decree on the direct election of the president of the Cosniglio, he suddenly stops and says: “Where do you think I should go, Madam Minister?“. And Borghi continues: “Minister Casellati cannot afford to address members of this assembly in those terms and with that gesture, especially because she was its president”. For group leader IV, “the nervousness, the approach taken by the government in this Chamber” is evident.
But what triggered Borghi’s reaction, what did Casellati do? “An unequivocal gesture”, according to Ivan Scalfarotto, who sits next to Borghi and takes the floor to have his say.< It's the minister's turn to reply: "Unlike Senator Borghi, I always have an attitude towards respecting people, which doesn't happen systematically on the part of Senator Borghi who always uses personal insults", says Casellati, and attacks: "You don’t say shame to a minister, to a government representative, I don’t have to be ashamed of anything“.
Casellati then explains: “When I talked about elimination, did you see me with the machine gun? I I was referring to the institution of senators for life, you use a verb exploiting it” and “my gesture referred to that elimination, but if one has to exploit it at all costs it’s not good, and shame on you strong>”.