Italian justice has sentenced the Minister of Regional Affairs and Autonomy, Roberto Calderoli, of the far-right Lega party, to seven months in prison for racially insulting Cécile Kyenge, Italy’s prime minister of African descent.
A court in Bergamo on Thursday upheld the conviction of grievous racial defamation against Cécile Kyenge after Roberto Calderoli, in 2013, when he was vice president of the Italian Senate, compared the then minister to an orangutan at a meeting of his party in Treviglio, in northern Italy.
The Italian judiciary has already sentenced the now minister in second instance, but the judges have annulled the earlier sentences.
However, the Italian Constitutional Court indicated that Roberto Calderoli cannot enjoy the constitutional protection of parliamentary immunity, despite the authorities stating that the senator’s opinion was “expressed by a deputy in the exercise of functions” and was therefore “indisputable” .
According to the constitution, opinions expressed outside the specific exercise of parliamentary functions are subject to immunity only if they are for the purpose of publicizing parliamentary activities, and therefore the privilege “cannot be extended to insults”.
Source: DN
