Italy’s foremost migrant labour and crop picker rights activist and only black MP on Thursday suspended himself from his leftwing party amid a probe into alleged day labourer exploitation by two pro-migrant collectives run by his mother-in-law.
Ivorian-born Aboubakar Soumahoro told his Green Europe-Left caucus he was suspending himself from the group after his mother-in-law, Marie Therese Mukamitsindo, was placed under investigation by prosecutors in Latina south of Rome for allegedly failing to pay workers and breaching their rights in the former Pomptine Plain marshes reclaimed and turned into rich farmland by Mussolini in the 1930s.
The cooperative, Karibu and Consorzio Aid, which were also run by Soumahoro’s wife Liliane Murekatete, allegedly also gave irregular contracts to workers.
The Italian media have accused Murekatete of living high on the hog while allegedly exploiting workers, running photos of her in designer clothes and accessories.
Green Europe chief Angelo Bonelli and Italian Left leader Nicola Fratoianni said Thursday that “with the utmost freedom, Aboubakar Soumahoro has told us he has decided to suspend himself from the parliamentary caucus of Green Europe-Left”.
They said “we respect this decision which, albeit not mandatory, shows the utmost respect that Aboubkara Soumahoro has for the institutions and the value of the political commitment to promote the issues of the battles in defence of the marginalised that we have always shared with him”.
Soumahoro entered parliament as Italy’s only black MP a month ago wearing muddy wellies to recall the migrant workers he has fought to lift out of wage slavery and inhumane conditions.