The president of the publishers Riccardo Levi would have resigned to the Ministry of Culture from the role of extraordinary commissioner of the government for Italy, a country that is a guest of honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2024 at the Ministry of Culture. The reasons are not related to the exclusion – later returned – of the physicist Rovelli from the Fair, but to a contract through which the Italian commissioner for the Frankfurt International Book Fair would have assigned the communication to a Belgian company, IFC Next where he works son Albert.
The case was raised by the newspaper “Libero”. Levi’s response to the accusation (who is the Italian commissioner for the Frankfurt Motor Show) was as follows: «IFC next is one of the great European communication companies whose customers are the European Parliament and the highest institutions of Brussels. He won the tender because he had the best and cheapest project. And my son never took care of the project, moreover, and he found that job on his own».
The Minister of Culture Sangiuliano immediately replied to Levi: «“I received a letter from Dr. Ricardo Franco Levi in which he says he is ready to make available the position of Extraordinary Commissioner of the government for Italy, guest of honor at the Frankfurt Book Fair 2024. I specify that I am not the person institutionally authorized to accept this resignation, while sharing the need to give discontinuity to this assignment after the recent controversies. I will inform the government to possibly agree on the appointment of a new commissioner. I thank dr. Levi for the sensitivity shown and the work done so far”.