The Five Star Movement has put an end to the Aprile case: "Full confidence in this honest and competent woman."

The Five Star Movement's national statement on the Foggia case has been extensive. As previously reported, the Five Star Movement has confirmed Lucia Aprile as deputy mayor.

Here's the statement: "The Five Star Movement acknowledges the self-mandated cancellation of the tender that was at the center of the recent controversy surrounding the ServItalia cooperative. This is a necessary step, highlighting how anomalies and critical issues emerged in that procedure that could not be ignored.

We thank those who raised awareness of the case and all the media professionals who, with their daily work, play a crucial role in verifying administrative activity. It is also thanks to this widespread oversight that institutions can correct their course and strengthen citizens' trust.

The Municipality of Foggia's membership in the Province's Single Contracting Authority was a step in the right direction, but it's not enough. The tenders below the threshold, still managed directly by the municipal Technical Structure, continue to present critical issues. We can no longer ignore this.

For this reason, in the spirit of constructive collaboration, we will ask Mayor Episcopo—who, like us, has always demonstrated a commitment to legality and transparency—to promote decisive action, capable of concretely improving the functioning of the administrative system.

Negotiation procedures need to be made more open, involving a greater number of companies, thus ensuring greater competition and transparency. More rigorous selection criteria are needed, based on the experience and reliability of economic operators, and more careful monitoring at every stage of the process.

Alongside this, we believe it is essential to strengthen the Contracts and Procurement sector's staff, leveraging the new members who have already entered service following last year's public competitions and planning, if necessary, additional hiring.

Our goal remains to achieve concrete results for Foggia, in full compliance with the rules. A city that has already paid a very high price due to a political system that, in the past, lost sight of the common good, giving way to power-hungry agendas and opaqueness, culminating in the dissolution of the previous administration due to mafia infiltration.

We want to state this clearly: neither Deputy Mayor Lucia Aprile nor any other representative of the Five Star Movement has ever exercised – nor could ever have exercised – the slightest influence on any stage of the procedure under discussion.

In this matter, we consider ourselves the injured party. And we will not accept moral lessons from those who pleaded guilty to bribery related to public contracts, nor from those who belong to parties responsible for dark pages in this city's administrative history. Clumsy attempts to muddy the waters with slanderous insinuations will never find us an easy target.

We reiterate our full confidence in Deputy Mayor Lucia Aprile: an honest, competent woman with profound respect for the institutions and the city she serves.

We will continue to work with seriousness and determination. Without discounts to anyone, but also without fueling summary trials or exploitative campaigns. The battle for transparency and legality will continue to be our guiding principle, in Foggia and throughout Italy.