M5S, Lawyer Grillo Sammarco: “With Conte, a fight between husband and wife, it is not certain that it will end up in court”

He approaches with a brisk pace toward the entrance of the building where the law firm that bears his name is located, a few steps from Piazza Cavour. But when the reporter, who is there waiting for him, tries to ask him about the thorny dispute between his client Beppe Grillo and the Five Star Movement president Giuseppe Conte, his desire to answer is zero, or almost zero. Pieremilio Sammarco, one of the most well-known lawyers in the capital, is the man to whom the guarantor and co-founder of the M5S has entrusted the task of winning the ‘war’ against Conte for control of the Five Star Movement. A battle with no holds barred, for now played only on the media level and through a dense correspondence culminating in a legal warning from Grillo. A real “dissing”, fans of Fedez and Tony Effe would say: but if the two rappers fight on social media dedicating vitriolic rhymes, Grillo and Conte do it with pec.

Before disappearing behind the large wooden door, Sammarco gives a couple of words to Adnkronos, giving his personal interpretation of the clash that is shaking up the top brass of the M5S and casting shadows on his future: “In my opinion – says the lawyer – this could be interpreted as a fight between husband and wife…”. Then Sammarco adds: “This quarrel is not necessarily destined to end in a legal dispute”. A detail of no small importance, if the one who utters these words is the lawyer of one of the two parties ‘in dispute’. So, the stamped papers are not just a foregone conclusion – as almost everyone, inside and outside the Movement, seems to hypothesize? The founder of the Sammarco e Associati law firm shrugs his shoulders, as if to say “who knows?”. Everything is in the hands of the two litigants. Sammarco is not an unknown figure in the five-star universe. In his office, a young Virginia Raggi, member of the Guarantee Committee and Grillo’s ‘ally’ in the dispute with the former Prime Minister, worked and did her internship, considered by the ‘Contians’ to be a sort of hidden prompter of the guarantor. In short, the thread that connects Sammarco, Raggi and Grillo certainly did not go unnoticed.

“But I – Sammarco replies to the reporter – have an expertise that goes beyond the links you prefigure. In my career I have followed several cases related to the use of symbols. From the UDC to Marco Rizzo’s Italian Communists, passing through the Italian Social Democratic Party, when it still existed. Issues that concerned the use of electoral symbols, even similar to this one”. One of the objects of the Conte-Grillo dispute is precisely the future of the 5 Star Movement symbol, in addition to the fate of the name ‘5 Star Movement’ and the double mandate rule. For Grillo these are unshakable taboos: no online consultation can change what the Genoese comedian considers the pillars of his political creature. Giuseppe Conte, on the contrary, would like members to decide on these and many other issues, during the next constituent assembly in the autumn.

In the meantime, the “dissing” continues. A guest on ‘4 di sera’ on Rete 4, Conte reiterated that the refoundation process will not stop, despite the opposition of the guarantor: “Grillo – the former tenant of Palazzo Chigi remarked – says that he is not the owner of the 5 Star Movement but the father. Of course, he is the founder of the Movement, he had this meritorious work of launching the Movement… But the father cannot think of having a remote control in his hand and exercising parental control by deciding what we have to watch, because we are a community of adults”.

Conte added: “I hope the matter ends here. If Grillo’s certified emails or formal warnings continue, it means that the lawyers will respond. I will no longer respond. I have already said that this process is irreversible and no one can stop it. I do not see any splits: a split occurs when there is no opportunity for discussion”. However, the guarantor does not intend to stop and on social media he once again goes after the president of the M5S: “I am still waiting for the answers to the questions sent more than 10 days ago to Giuseppe Conte” Grillo wrote on X, reposting the letter – sent to Conte and the Guarantee Committee – in which the co-founder of the Movement raised doubts about the constituent voting process.

(by Antonio Atte)