The news on Mentana, Gruber, Cairo, Travaglio, Lucarelli, Annunziata, Toti and more

The signs of disenchantment and criticism (direct or indirect) at the top of La7 continue from Enrico Mentana, director of the TV news headed by Urbano Cairo, while Discovery with Nove is stocking up on stars and big names.

ENRICO MENTANA'S LATEST SIGNAL TO LA7

The latest signal sent by Mentana is unequivocal: a reprimand to the top of the network and, in fact, also to the publisher. Here is what happened and what are the precedents of this recently tormented relationship after years of idyll.

THE FIGHT BETWEEN GRUBER AND MENTANA ON LA7

“One to nine percent in half an hour. This is the audience curve – completely similar to those of previous days – of last night's Tgla7, marked by important and continuously updated events. However, that news program was unpredictably followed by a seriously contemptuous judgment towards me by the person hosting the next programme, who is also the direct beneficiary of that ascending curve every evening". This is what the director of TgLa7, Enrico Mentana, wrote on social media, responding to Lilli Gruber who opened Otto e mezzo yesterday by complaining about the delay with which I had received the line from the news. “Welcome to 8.46pm and not to half past eight – the presenter had said – and not even to half past eight. Incontinence is a bad thing.”

“A judgment – ​​Mentana underlined today – from which so far no one among the top management of La7 has felt the need to distance themselves. Small episode, but very indicative. At this point, as is right, I distance myself from the rude and the lazy." According to one interpretation of Mentana's post, Gruber certainly includes rude people. And among the ignoble are the corporate leaders of La7?

MENTANA'S SIBILLINA INTERVIEW WITH LA STAMPA ON HER CONTRACT WITH LA7

A few days ago, Mentana gave an interview to the newspaper La Stampa while Amadeus moved from Rai to Discovery's Nove. And the La7 news director nonchalantly reminds us that his contract expires at the end of the year… Here is the initial part of the interview:

Enrico Mentana's office in the La 7 headquarters in Rome is full of boxes. “But I'm not going anywhere.” In the morning Fiorello spoke, half seriously and half jokingly, about his move to Discovery together with Giovanni Floris. The director of Tg La7 smiles, is silent for a while, then: «I have no difficulty in saying that my contract expires on 31 December 2024. Fifteen days later I will turn 70, what am I going to do?».

Does it make it a registry issue?
«For goodness sake, only Catholics for marriage say that you never change, but I brought about the birth of Tg5, the rebirth of La 7 Tg which Piroso had already started very well, I hosted two news programs that were very much based on me. That seems enough to me."

Tired?
«No, but I always left when there weren't the conditions to work well. It happened at Rai in '92 and at Mediaset in 2009. They were crucial eves: the first one year before Tangentopoli, the second two years before the end of the Berlusconi era. It's no coincidence: when things are going well in a company you're free, when they're no longer working and you realize you can't do it, you leave."

IS ENRICO MENTANA LEAVING LA7?

So Mentana is leaving? Certainly the editorial and journalistic consonance between Cairo and Mentana seems to have diminished. Also because – TV observers note – Mentana doesn't appreciate the network's talk shows too much, which in some cases have anti-centre-right and anti-Meloni tones and accents. And it is no coincidence that the web newspaper founded by Mentana now has a director whose professional history is closer to the centre-right than to the centre-left, such as Franco Bechis, former director of the newspaper Il Tempo and already at the top of Libero Quotidiano . Without neglecting the ways in which Mentana has distanced himself from the journalistic and television battle launched by Massimo Giannini, editorialist for Repubblica .

MENTANA WAITS FOR A WORD FROM CAIRO

But it's not over. Mentana asks La7 for a signal after the "very unpleasant and offensive" words uttered by Lilli Gruber towards the news director, 'guilty' of having exceeded the deadlines by delaying the start of the episode of Eight and a Half which aired on the 6th May. “Last night we went a little long with the news, it was a crucial, very important day: the prospect of peace in the Middle East, the tragedy of Casteldaccia, near Palermo. Plus like every Monday there were our surveys and the appointment with Milena Gabanelli's Data Room. Like every Monday we went a little long, I apologize to the viewers. A little long, as was pre-established and agreed with those who manage this network”, says Mentana, closing today's news. “Whoever followed us, Lilli Gruber, because I don't like pretending not to know names and surnames, had very unpleasant and offensive words towards myself. I have been sitting here for 14 years to do this news, I have never intentionally offended anyone, much less my colleagues who work on this network. I would appreciate reciprocity in this regard and I would appreciate it from the company I work for that there was no silence that has accompanied this affair for 24 hours. Tomorrow evening we will see if there was something, otherwise I will draw conclusions and direct consequences", he concludes.

MENTANA-CAIRO TENSIONS?

But there was previously an episode – reported by Start Magazine – which was read as another sign of disenchantment towards the editor of La7. And it arises from the Giletti-Baiardo-Cairo case .