“No battle on the skin of Liguria, never pocketed a euro” –

Giovanni Toti, after 86 days of pillorying, was released yesterday and today, after the preliminary investigations judge Paola Faggioni accepted the request to revoke his house arrest presented by his lawyer Stefano Savi, he met with the representatives of his list in a closed-door meeting. “We will take stock with the list and with the administrators who have carried out the work during these 86 days of house arrest for Giovanni Toti – explained the councilor for Civil Protection, Giacomo Giampedrone – Then we will decide our future. But we also wanted to say goodbye to the president”. On the candidates for the next regional elections, “we are working on it and next week Toti will be in Rome: I hope that the next few weeks will bring good news”. Among those present at the meeting were the deputy and regional coordinator of the Toti List, Ilaria Cavo, the regional councilor for urban planning, Marco Scajola and the regional councilor for Health, Angelo Gratarola.

“There was no political isolation. With the lawyer Savi we considered that I would martyr myself, the prosecutor’s office would not change its position and we would fight a battle on the skin of Liguria”: this is how Giovanni Toti explained his resignation as president of Liguria, meeting with journalists after the meeting with his list. “We decided that it was more logical to give the Ligurians their say again and face a trial, without avoiding a confrontation with the magistrates. For the first time, it was written in black and white that the possibility of repeating the crime depended on the function exercised by an elected official. Parliament must question itself on this”, he continued.

As for the future, he continued, “we decided that it was more logical to give the Ligurians the floor again. Toti will not be there as a candidate or as president: the protagonists will be others. What I recommended to the mayors I have met and will meet, and who do not have a shirt of the national parties, is that we must not lose the impetus and the alchemy between the governing parties and the civic soul that must be there and will be there. It must be a guarantee to the voters that this political party will not change the way of governing this region of the center-right”. Speaking about the investigation into corruption in Liguria, the former governor then stressed: “The accusations of corruption do not imply that Giovanni Toti or anyone on his behalf pocketed a euro for himself or a benefit dedicated to him or his family. I can proudly say that I am much poorer than I was 9 years ago when I directed the news programs of the Mediaset group with salaries and benefits much more substantial than the excellent ones of the president of the Region”.