Confiscated assets: a waste of state resources

«We are the State". This is the sign that welcomes visitors to the Pietra cooperative. waste in Cerignola, in the province of Foggia, where the lands seized from the boss Rosario Giordano produce olive oil and tomatoes, and provide work to a group of young farmers.

ASSETS CONFISCATED FROM THE MAFIA

The history of Cerignola, unfortunately, although not unique, does not balance the enormous waste of the assets seized from organized crime clansWe have a good law on the matter (dating back to 1996), thousands of seizures that are ongoing, aNational Agency for the Administration and Disposition of Assets Seized and Confiscated from Organized Crime (Anbsc), established in 2010, but then everything got bogged down in the darkness of bureaucracy and a lack of real resources. Not to mention corruption.

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ASSETS CONFISCATED FROM THE MAFIA

The first problem is the length of the process to deliver a seized asset and reuse it. Years. Three to five, at least. Meanwhile, properties and businesses become impoverished, lose value, and turn into empty shells, totally wasted. Then there's the theme of resources: neither the associations of voluntary Nor do municipalities (especially small ones) have the financial resources and personnel expertise to efficiently manage seized assets. And the sale, according to the law, is only permitted as a last resort. ratio, however, when the seized property has lost any importance for potential buyers.

GOODS SEIZED FROM THE MAFIA

Entire buildings, condominiums, villas, cottages, houses and apartmentsPlaces with which it would be possible, quickly and transparently, to provide decent housing not only to the many refugees who occupy illegal buildings, but also to many homeless or families in extreme poverty. We're also talking, in addition to real estate, about businesses confiscated and managed through the clique of commissioner positions, without ever managing to put them back into operation effectively and productively, perhaps even providing jobs for many. unemployed youthConfiscated companies and business managements have even ended up in the crosshairs of investigations by the Public Prosecutor's Office, with the truly diabolical and discouraging effect (another civil waste) of an illegality that, instead of becoming legal, generates other crimes, other misdeeds, other scams.

ASSETS CONFISCATED FROM CRIME

Prefect Bruno Corda himself, director of the National Agency for the Administration and Disposition of Assets Seized and Confiscated from Criminals, painted a truly disheartening picture of the situation: confiscated businesses, managed by commissioners appointed from time to time by state bodies, almost always end up in liquidation. The same goes for abandoned properties. And so the state ultimately stamps a double wasteIt spends resources and men to manage seized assets and, instead of making them useful to the community, drags them down a dead-end track.

TO KNOW MORE: Children taken from mafia bosses: a necessary measure or a mistake?

WASTE OF GOODS CONFISCATED FROM THE MAFIA

And let's talk about Cash, a little treasure of over 3 billion, always seized from Mafia, Camorra, and Ndrangheta clans: money rotting in ministerial coffers and in some recesses of our public bureaucracy, where alongside many good people who work with a sense of the "common good" and passion, there are small and powerful clans that have made their fortune from inaction. To make money and careers, always and only under the banner of state waste.

HOW TO USE ASSETS SEIZED FROM THE MAFIA

A seized asset is a victory for the State. A seized and unused asset is not only a waste, but also a defeat for the StateThis heritage cannot be left at the mercy of individual magistrates, and the Agency must be provided with the means, tools, and resources, likely by transforming it into a public economic body.

The Agency must be equipped with the necessary staff in finance, business management, and real estate: people capable of valuing the seized assets before handing them over to management. The resources for this operation can be found within the funds of the Recovery Plan, and the Conte II government had earmarked €300 million to revalue confiscated assets. A generic and unnecessary expense.

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