Mario Tanassi

Mario Tanassi

Mario Tanassi (17 March 1916[1] – 5 May 2007) was an Italian politician, who was several times Minister of the Italian Republic. In 1979 he was condemned by the Constitutional Court of Italy for his involvement in the Lockheed bribery scandal.

Biography

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Tanassi was born at Ururi, in the province of Campobasso.[2] He joined the Italian Democratic Socialist Party (Partito Socialista Democratico Italiano; PSDI) and was later national co-secretary, alongside Francesco De Martino, of the unified PSI-PSDI, a short-lived reunion of the PSDI and the Italian Socialist Party.[3][4] In 1963 he became a deputy in the Chamber of Deputies, a position he would hold until 1979.[5]

He was minister of defence for the first time in the Rumor II Cabinet (1970), formed by an alliance between Christian Democracy (DC), PSI and PSDI. In 1972 he was again appointed as minister of defence, as well as vice-prime minister, in the Andreotti II Cabinet (in which the Italian Liberal Party had replaced the Socialists). Tanassi was minister of defence for the third time in the fourth Rumor Government (DC-PSI-PSDI-PRI).

After a short tenure in 1972, in June 1975 he again became national secretary of the PSDI, replacing Flavio Orlandi. Soon afterwards, he was involved in the Lockheed bribery scandal together with Mariano Rumor and Luigi Gui, causing him to lose his position as the party's secretary. In 1979 the Constitutional Court of Italy found him guilty of bribery and he spent four months in jail.[6] He was the first Italian former minister to serve a prison sentence and the first politician convicted before the nationwide Clean Hands corruption scandals in the 1990s.[7]

References

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  1. ^ Vita italiana (in Italian). Presidenza del consiglio dei ministri, Servizi informazioni e della proprietà letteraria. 1973. p. 750. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  2. ^ "Tanassi, Mario". Treccani (in Italian). Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  3. ^ Baldan, Attilio (2007). Un paese di eroi e parassiti: riflessioni sulla cultura politica italiana contemporanea (in Italian). Aracne. p. 177. ISBN 978-88-548-1026-6. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  4. ^ Gregori, Enrico (4 July 2016). "4 luglio 1968 Si riunisce a Roma la corrente "Rinnovamento socialista"". Il Messaggero (in Italian). Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  5. ^ "Mario Tanassi / Deputati / Camera dei deputati - Portale storico". storia.camera.it. Retrieved 16 December 2024.
  6. ^ CORTE COSTITUZIONALE IN COMPOSIZIONE INTEGRATA. "Sentenza nel giudizio penale di accusa n. 1 del registro generale 1977". Sentenza Lockheed. Consulta Online. Retrieved 12 October 2011.
  7. ^ Colazingari, Silvia; Rose-Ackerman, Susan (1998). "Corruption in a Paternalistic Democracy: Lessons from Italy for Latin America". Political Science Quarterly. 113 (3): 465. doi:10.2307/2658076. ISSN 0032-3195. JSTOR 2658076.
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Political offices
Preceded by Secretary of the Italian Democratic Socialist Party
1964-1966 		Succeeded by
Unification with the Italian Socialist Party
Preceded by Secretary of the Italian Democratic Socialist Party
1972 		Succeeded by
Preceded by Secretary of the Italian Democratic Socialist Party
1975-1976 		Succeeded by
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