Mario Clemente Mastella (born 5 February 1947) is an Italian politician who has been the mayor of Benevento since 20 June 2016. He also served as leader of the Union of Democrats for Europe (UDEUR), a minor centrist and Christian-democratic Italian party. Mastella, who began his career in the Christian Democracy (DC) party, being elected to the Chamber of Deputies in 1976, is known for his trasformismo, changing over his career many political parties and affiliations. Mastella was Minister of Labour and Social Policies in the first Berlusconi government from 10 May 1994 to 17 January 1995 and Minister of Justice in the second Prodi government from 17 May 2006 to 17 January 2008. During the same period, he was a member of the Senate of the Republic and determined the narrow majority of Romano Prodi's government, which ended when he started the 2008 Italian government crisis that led to Prodi's resignation as prime minister and Silvio Berlusconi return to power after the snap election that ensued. In June 2009, he was elected to the European Parliament on the list of The People of Freedom (PdL) of Berlusconi; it was his second stint at the European Parliament, after a first term with the UDEUR from 1999 until 2004. After having been the mayor of Ceppaloni twice in three separate decades (1980s, 1990s, and 2000s), he was elected mayor of Benevento in 2016 and re-elected in 2021.

Early life and education

Mastella was born in Ceppaloni, in the province of Benevento. He graduated in philosophy at the University of Naples Federico II with a thesis on Antonio Gramsci, and later became a journalist. His career as a journalist and his beginnings in political life have been widely described by himself in various interviews, cited for example in the book La casta by Sergio Rizzo and Gian Antonio Stella, where his hiring at the RAI, Italy's public broadcasting, had been helped by a recommendation from the DC politician Ciriaco De Mita. The local editorial office where Mastella took office proclaimed a three-day strike against the entry into the role of a journalist hired without regular competition and for direct political appointment.

Political career

Deputy, mayor of Ceppaloni, and Minister of Labour

In 1976, Mastella was elected to the Chamber of Deputies as a member of the DC party. In 1986, he became mayor of Ceppaloni, a position he held until 1992 and again from 2003 to 2008. From 1989 to 1992, he was the Secretary of State to the Ministry of Defence. From 1993 to 1994, he was the vice-president of the Chamber of Deputies. After the party's dissolution in 1994, Mastella joined with Pier Ferdinando Casini to found a new party, the Christian Democratic Centre (CCD). That same year, following the election victory of Berlusconi, he was appointed Minister of Labour and Social Policies. In 1998, after the fall of the first Prodi government, Mastella decided to follow Francesco Cossiga, lifetime senator and former Italian president. Mastella left his party to found the Christian Democrats for the Republic (CDR), then Democratic Union for the Republic (UDR). This new political party, which supported the new centre-left coalition government led by Massimo D'Alema, lasted one year. In 1999, Mastella took over the leadership of UDEUR and was elected to the European Parliament. In 2005, Mastella took part in the centre-left coalition's primary election for the leadership of The Union. He obtained 4.6% of the vote. Mastella and the then Sicily president Salvatore Cuffaro were subjects of a scandal when it was revealed that they had been the best men of Francesco Campanella, a former member of the Sicilian Mafia who helped the boss Bernardo Provenzano when he was a fugitive from the law. Mastella had been a witness at Campanella's wedding in July 2000.

Senator and Minister of Justice

In 2006, Mastella became minister of Justice in the second Prodi government. Mastella promoted a general amnesty in 2006. He also proposed criminalising Holocaust denial but dropped the proposal after opposition by historians and concerns about such a law being unconstitutional. As Minister of Justice, Mastella received an advice of judicial proceedings in February 2007 from the Naples prosecutors' office. The office was investigating Mastella for fraudulent bankruptcy regarding the collapse of the Naples football club SSC Napoli in 2004. Mastella had been the vice-president of the club's board of directors. In September 2007, Mastella asked the High Council of the Judiciary to arrange the transfer of Catanzaro prosecuting attorney Luigi De Magistris, who was inquiring on a committee of illegal transactions composed by politicians (including Mastella himself) and magistrates. Mastella's wife, Sandra Lonardo, at the time also a UDEUR politician who was the acting president of the Regional Council of Campania. She had been under house arrest for suspected bribery since 16 January 2008. Meanwhile, Mastella resigned from his position as Justice Minister; in announcing his resignation, he said that "between the love of my family and power I choose the former" and expressed his desire to be "more free from a political and personal point of view". Prodi rejected the resignation. On 17 January 2008, Mastella said again that he was resigning. Prodi was to temporarily take over his portfolio. In 2017, Mastella was cleared of charges.

2008 Italian political crisis

Despite having earlier said that he would support Prodi's government without participating in it, Mastella said on 21 January 2008 that his party was ending its support, thereby depriving the government of its narrow majority in the Senate of the Republic. Mastella said that UDEUR wanted an early election and that it would vote against the government if there was a vote of confidence. Mastella's decision occurred a few days after the Constitutional Court of Italy confirmed that there would be a referendum to modify the electoral system. Earlier in 2007, Mastella had stated more than once that if the referendum was confirmed, it would lead directly to the fall of the government. The fall of the government disrupted a pending election-law referendum that, if it had been passed, would have made it harder for small parties like Mastella's to gain seats in the Italian Parliament. On 6 February 2008, Mastella announced that he would be part of Berlusconi's House of Freedoms party. On 1 March 2008, Berlusconi refused to form a coalition with Mastella, citing too many differences in their political programmes. After failing to secure a coalition with any other political party, Mastella decided to quit the electoral competition on 7 March 2008, as the Italian electoral system subjects political parties not a part of a coalition to thresholds of 4% and 8% for the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic, respectively.

Member of the European Parliament

From 1999 to 2004, Mastella was a member of the European Parliament (MEP) for UDEUR as part of the European People's Party (EPP). In June 2009, Mastella was elected for a second time a MEP on the EPP list of Berlusconi's PdL party. In July 2009, he attracted attention because of statements made about the per diem collected at the European Parliament. In a lift to his assistants, he said: "An allowance of 290 euro! It's misery. ... They do not know what you get in the Italian Parliament." In the first months of the Seventh European Parliament legislature (2009–2014), he was one of the MEPs less present during voting in plenary meetings.

Mayor of Benevento

On 20 June 2016, Mastella was elected mayor of Benevento as head of a centre-right coalition. In July 2019, Mastella was considered as a Forza Italia (FI) candidate for the 2020 Campania regional election. On 3 June 2020, he left FI to create a regional list named Us Campanians (NC) in support of centre-left coalition incumbent president Vincenzo De Luca for his re-election campaign. In 2021, he was re-elected mayor of Benevento through civic lists.

Personal life

In 1975, Mastella married Sandra Lonardo, a native of Benevento whom he met during a visit to an uncle in Oyster Bay, New York, where she spent a good part of her youth. They have two son, Elio and Pellegrino.

Electoral history

Source: Ministry of the Interior