Tasos Mantelis, Minister of Transport back in 1998 under Simitis Governement, does not resample a tiny bit the young & vulnerable Alain Delon (Rocco Parondi) in the famous 1960 Visconti film “Rocco & His Brothers”.
Tasos Mantelis looks more like the bully Renato Salvatori (Simone Parondi), Rocco’s brother in the film.
Yet Tasos Mantelis seems to feel emotionally closer to family-loving Rocco. Rocco steps back from the heart of a woman for the sake of Simone. Rocco would do everything to keep his family whole.
Tasos Mantelis identifies himself clearly with Rocco, and distances from Simone, who rapes and murders Nadia (Annie Girardot).
Mantelis would share his account with his best man and his daughter, Mantelis would transfer money to his son…. If only this money wasn’t SIEMENS’s ‘sponsorship money’ to a Greek Minister on duty!
Who, the hell, is “Rocco” and “A. Roccos”?
Tasos Mantelis admited earlier today in front of the investigation committee of the Greek Parliament, that he had opened bank accounts to deposit ‘sponsorship money’ from the infamous SIEMENS, involved in a worldwide bribery scandal.
Certainly Mr. Mantelis would not have come out with a single word, if it wasn’t his close friend and best man, Giwrgos Tsougranis, confessing yesterday before the investigation committee that he (Tsougranis) had opened accounts for the SIEMENS money.
Rocco & His Greek Relatives
According to confessions of Best Man Tsougranis, he opened an account under the name A.Rocco at Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce, Geneva branch, in Switzerland. Tsougranis allegedly later added a co-account holder, Mantelis’s daughter.
1998 and before the upcoming election, Mantelis informed him that he is in urgent need of sponsorship because his election campaign costs. The best man and friend opened a bank account, which appeared retrospectively that had two co-owners: Rocco & A. Rocco.
This account received two money transfers:
One of DM 200.000 &
One of DM 250.00 — total DM 450.000.-
Tsougranis confessed further that he transferred to an account of ALPHA Bank/Athens the amount of € 163.000.
Apparently from the DM 200.000 transfer, two sub-transfers go to a bank account belonging to X.M., who claimed to be Mantelis’ son, a student at Columbia University in New York. The two transfers totaling € 35.000.
Sponsoring a Minister
Giwrgos Tsougranis didn’t omit to confess that when he asked Mantelis where the first transfer money came from, the then Minister answered him, that it was ‘sponsorship money from SIEMENS”. Tsougranis did not know where the 2nd money transfer of DM 250.000 came from.
In 1997 Tasos Mantelis, being Minister of Transport, signed on the part of the State the Framework Agreement between the Greek State and SIEMENS for the supply of digital telephone centers for the national telephone company OTE.
Italian Neorealism vs. Greek Surrealism
Visconti’s tragical film, a typical artifact of Italian Neorealism, ends with no substantive resolution between Rocco and his brother Simone. Yet the clouds of doom will keep hanging over the family long after on the film appears THE END.
In Tasos Mantelis case things lay differently. Mantelis most probably will not be brought to justice because his crime (receiving ‘sponsorship’ by a private company) has been timely ‘barred’. But the social outcry will be hanging forever over his head and his family. If he gives a euro-cent about it!
Important Note: Information Sources
Mantelis – Tsougranis: Greek Media
Rocco and His Brothers: wikipedia
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