by Michele A. Cortelazzo
Qatargate is the name that the press, not only Italian, attributed to the scandal that occurred on December 9, 2022 following an investigation by Belgian justice, which accused certain deputies and lobbyists working in the European Parliament of corruption, including, in a prominent position, some Italians. The accusation is that of having received money or generous gifts from Qatar to influence the decisions of the European Parliament in favor of this State.
All the scandals since Watergate
The -gate composition element has long been used to produce names that indicate scandals, usually of international origin. The model comes from the name of the most famous international scandal, the one which refers to the events of 1972, during the American presidential elections, when the staff of the Republican candidate (later winner) Richard Nixon spied on the activities of the opposition electoral committee who was based at Watergate Hotel. Over the years, many international scandals have been named using this dialing element taken from the hotel’s name: sexgate, datagate, dieselgate, tabloidgate, sofagate, Fifagate, Mitterandgate, Monicagate, Irangate, Italygate, Nigergate, (but sometimes also Italian scandals, like Irpiniagate, Laziogate, Legagate, Moggigate, Rubygate, have been denominated with the confix -gate, although for Italian scandals it is more common the composing element -poli, from Tangentopoli). You may not like to use it (for example, Dario Braga, an eminent chemist from the University of Bologna, commented in his personal profile on Facebook: “but why ‘Qatargate’? What is the “door” has to do with it (door, door, passage… – everything comes from Watergate… but it was a hotel… what is the Italian press perpetually ridiculing (and not only…)?”), but the fact remains that it has been very widespread for years, in many languages.
In institutional debates
Qatargate is only the latest offspring of this offspring and has not been confined to journalistic prose. It also entered into institutional debates. For example, during the Senate session on December 14, 2022, Barbara Floridia of the “Mouvement Cinqestelle” said: “And in this phase of the so-called Qatargate, arriving in Europe with our measures to sweep away corruption, with our moral question , would have been a good way to get there head-on. The day before, Senator Raffaele Speranzon (Brothers of Italy) had asked a question that contained this premise: “considering that, as far as the interrogator understands: among the organizers of the event was initially also the non-governmental organization” Fight Impunity”, chaired by Antonio Panzeri, a former Democratic Party MEP as well as a member of “Article One – Democratic and Progressive Movement”, currently under arrest in Belgium following the corruption investigation known informally as the name of “Qatargate””, while on December 21, 2022, Massimiliano Romeo (Lega) inserted these words in the introduction to one of his questions: “In recent weeks, the so-called “Qatargate” affair, the investigation into allegations of corruption involving members of the European Parliament, attracted widespread attention; as reported by “in recent weeks, the so-called “Qatargate” affair, the investigation into allegations of corruption involving members of the European Parliament, has attracted widespread attention; as reported by “in recent weeks, the so-called “Qatargate” affair, the investigation into allegations of corruption involving members of the European Parliament, has attracted widespread attention; as reported by Belgian media, Qatar would have acted with the aim of influencing the economic and political decisions of the European Parliament through sums of money and gifts to third parties, who had a role and position considered strategic in the within the European institution.
In Parliament
In Parliament, the word enters with a series of “verbal greetings” (“the so-called Qatargate”, “a corruption investigation informally known as ‘Qatargate'”, “the matter known as of “Qatargate””), but he enters nonetheless. It should be noted, however, that the Prime Minister, who even at the end-of-year conference was prompted by a question to give her opinion on the affair, did not use Qatargate, contrary to what might leave believe some journalistic reports (e.g. AGI headlined its December 15, 2022 launch: “Meloni: ‘On Qatargate, we must go all the way and no discounts must be made’. However, this is not not a literal quote from Giorgia Meloni).
The World Cup scandal
But Qatargate was not born in 2022 on the occasion of this scandal. That of 2022 is the revival of a word already present in the press in 2013. This time, the scandal concerned the football world championships (which, ironically, took place from November 20 to December 18, 2022, c ie also days when the new Qatargate broke ). The first to use the word, on January 29, 2013, was the newspaper “France Football”, which, as reported by “Le Monde” on the same day, had denounced Qatargate with a headline in white characters on a black background. But the news, and the word, of “France Football” was also immediately taken up by “République” which, again on January 29, gave the first attestation of the word in Italian: “France Football magazine, one of the most important Europe, with a 20-page file entitled “Qatargate”, denounces the alleged illicit maneuvers which led, on December 2, 2010, to the awarding of the World Cup scheduled for 9 years from now”.
Source: moroccomail
