Hotel-builder demolishes government

ROME - All Francesco Mannella wanted to know was why the hotel he was building did not qualify for a European Community loan. And when he was refused an answer last week, he called the police, writes Patricia Clough.

Now Mr Mannella and the people of the central Italian region of Abruzzo are pinching themselves in disbelief. The head of their regional government, Rocco Salini, and eight members of his cabinet are in jail charged with attempting to defraud European and Italian taxpayers of 450bn lire (pounds 230m)

Italians are used to waking up in the morning to learn that politicians have been marched off to jail overnight. But this is the first time that almost an entire regional government has been arrested. While the authorities worry about how this mountainous and underdeveloped region is to be run, both the magistrates and EC officials are trying to find out what happened.

Mr Mannella had been building a hotel in the town of Ateleta and believed it had a good chance of benefiting from EC funds. When he asked to see the documents showing why his application had been rejected, he was told there were none. So he called the police.

The Abruzzi cabinet, which is also charged with abuse of public office, allegedly failed to observe the EC's criteria for the distribution of funds.