Cardinals Divided. Bertone's Management under Fire

By Giacomo Galeazzi
Vatican Insider
May 27, 2012

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Inside the Vatican

The IOR events divide the cardinals. Thursday the lay governing council of the 'Vatican bank' fired its president Ettore Gotti Tedeschi with a series of accusations. But most people know that the 'pope's strongbox' is looked after by a double management. Above the lay-supervisory council is the cardinals' commssion which met on Friday, but was unable to release a statement.This was an unprecedented event and a sign that an agreement has not yet been reached. the committee includes cardinals Attilio Nicora, Jean-Louis Tauran, Telesphore Placidus Toppo and Odilo Pedro Scherer, led by the Secretary of State Tarcisio Bertone . Apparently Nicora and Tauran criticised Bertone over his management of Gotti Tedeschi's dismissal and the issue of the negotiation which would lead the Holy See to finally join Ocse's 'white list' , a record of financially virtuous countries".

The experts from Moneyval, the European Council group that deals with rating countries' measures against money laundering and terror funding are still monitoring the Vatican's regulations and procedures. Moreover Nicora resents Bertone for taking power away from the Aif, the Vatican internal information authority that he leads, slowing down the journey towards financial transparency. It is hard to tell if the clash within the cardinals'commission involves the evaluation of Gotti Tedeschi's work. But there are no doubts that this will have repercussions on the nomination of the new president. At the moment the favourite to succeed Gotti Tedeschi is vice-president Ronaldo Hermann Schmitz, a banker from Piacenza. But the there are many theories. The ideal candidate is the former leader of Bundesbank, Hans Tietmeyer, from Germany, who would be a welcome choice for the pope, but he is very old. Now within the cardinals'commission there are two distinct currents. On one side those (Nicora, Tauran) who believe that transparency, the need to comply with international standard to be included in the 'white list' is paramount, on the other those who like Bertone believe that this line of action must be followed with moderation, since the Vatican is unqiue and cannot be compared with other sovreign states. Apparently Moneyval concluded, after the first inspection, last November, that the new regulation was 'too vague' . It therefore went through quite substantial changes.

All this did not happen without heated debates and internal conflicts (at the very time of the leaks and poison pen threats).On the 25th of January, the regulation was urgently modified and completed with changes to the AIF powers of supervision, whose inspections are now regulated. Despite discomfort and some opposition from various departments, the Holy See's intention is to have rules that truly comply with international standards. There are still many aspects to adjust and clarify and this new 'storm' at high levels in the IOR could provoke damages that are hard to predict.