Sangiuliano's exit won't weaken govt says Meloni

(ANSA) - ROME, SEP 7 - Premier Giorgia Meloni said Saturday that her government would not be weakened by the resignation of Gennaro Sangiuliano as culture minister after he was embroiled in a scandal over a would-be advisor he had an affair with.
    Conservative journalist Alessandro Giuli, the president of Rome's MAXXI contemporary art museum, was sworn in on Friday as Sangiuliano's successor.
    "If anyone thinks that situations like the Sangiuliano one can weaken the government, they are mistaken," Meloni told the European House-Ambrosetti (TEHA) Forum at Cernobbio on Lake Como on Saturday.
    "The king is dead - long live the king.
    "A minister has resigned, I wish the new minister well for his work".
    Meloni thanked Sangiuliano for "significantly increasing visitors and revenues for the many cultural attractions that Italy has" and for launching "major projects that had been at a standstill for decades".
    She also took aim at the woman at the centre of the scandal, influencer and businesswoman Maria Rosario Boccia, whose posts saying she had become an advisor to Sangiuliano and photos with him at official events triggered concerns she had access to classified communications and her activities were being paid for by public money - something Sangiuliano had ruled out.
    "My idea of how a woman should earn herself a place in society is diametrically opposed to that of this person," Meloni said.
    (ANSA).