ROME - - Italy has been unable to prevent Sinochem, a Chinese-owned state company, from exploiting tyre manufacturing company Pirelli for Beijing's own purposes. 

 Despite the Chinese company pledging not to interfere when it bought its stake, the reality has been quite the opposite. According to the newspaper Il Mattino, the appointment of tyre producing giant Pirelli’s managing director has been taken away from Camfin. Camfin is a holding sector company owned by Marco Tronchetti Provera and the company is also a shareholder in Pirelli, with a 14% stake. Il Mattino argues that all of Pirelli’s strategic levers are in the hands of the Chinese Communist Party. 

 On Sunday, Pirelli declared in a statement to its investors that the Italian government had ruled that Camfin alone could nominate candidates to be its next chief executive.

 Pirelli also said Meloni’s government had decided that any changes to the company's corporate governance should be subject to official scrutiny. This comes after Sinochem told the Italian government in March that it planned to renew and edit the existing shareholder pact.

 The shadow of Beijing over Italian business affairs was also present in 2015, when a deal was made between Camfin and the Chinese group ChemChina, now known as Sinochem. During this pact, the two men made a pact for the control of the tyre company Pirelli.

 Total management of Pirelli was left to the Italians - the new shareholder would initially benefit from all profits. Eight years later, China’s Communist Party, led by Xi Jinping claims all rights to the company. This is despite having already extracted 1.2 billion out of the 1.6 billion paid, a couple of years later it put 20% back on the market, despite maintaining its 37% share.

 The caution with which Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni recently addressed the issue of the Memorandum between Italy and China on the so-called 'Silk Road' is a sign of the huge sensitivity surrounding the dossier. 

 But while on a political level there is still time for a decisive debate - although yesterday from Washington, Minister Adolfo Urso already clarified the Italian position - for some weeks now, the Palazzo Chigi has been grappling with a case in need of an urgent solution because it concerns the future of one of Italy's largest industrial entities: the Pirelli group.

 Il Mattino proposes that a viable solution would be if a different shareholding combination were to be developed around Camfin, along with a renegotiation of Sinochem’s shareholding in homage to the original spirit, although the paper admits this is very improbable given Beijing’s hardline position on the matter.

 If this were to be successful, Il Mattino concludes, it would be relatively straightforward to engage the group’s allies to build a new, predominantly Italian, command block. Either this, or the government’s Golden Power offices, designed to protect businesses which are strategically important to Italy, should take control.

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