JUDGMENT NO. 148
YEAR 2025
ITALIAN REPUBLIC
IN THE NAME OF THE ITALIAN PEOPLE
THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT
composed of:
President: Giovanni AMOROSO;
Judges: Francesco VIGANÒ, Luca ANTONINI, Stefano PETITTI, Angelo BUSCEMA, Emanuela NAVARRETTA, Maria Rosaria SAN GIORGIO, Marco D’ALBERTI, Giovanni PITRUZZELLA, Antonella SCIARRONE ALIBRANDI, Maria Alessandra SANDULLI, Roberto Nicola CASSINELLI, Francesco Saverio MARINI,
has pronounced the following
JUDGMENT
in the proceeding concerning a conflict of attribution between public entities, arising from the injunctive order issued by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari on December 20, 2024, filed on January 3, 2025, and served on the same date upon the President of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, Alessandra Todde, initiated by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia with an appeal served on March 3, 2025, filed in the Registry on the same date, registered under no. 2 of the register of conflicts between public entities 2025 and published in the Official Gazette of the Republic no. 12, special series, of the year 2025.
Having reviewed the submissions by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, as well as those by the President of the Council of Ministers and the Minister of Justice;
Having reviewed the intervention submission by Riccardo Fercia on his own behalf;
Having heard the Reporting Judge Maria Rosaria San Giorgio in the public hearing of September 24, 2025;
Having heard the counsel Omar Chessa and Antonio Saitta for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, Riccardo Fercia for the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, and the State counsel Fabrizio Fedeli for the President of the Council of Ministers;
Deliberated in the Chamber of Council on September 24, 2025.
Facts Considered
1.– With the appeal filed on March 3, 2025, and registered under no. 2 of the register of conflicts between public entities for 2025, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, represented by the acting Vice-President, initiated a conflict of attribution against the State (and, for it, the Presidency of the Council of Ministers), the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, and the Ministry of Justice, in the person of the acting Minister, requesting this Court to declare that it was not within the competence of the State and, for it, the aforementioned Panel to "impose 'the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate' as President of the Region, and to order by 'injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council ... the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia'".
Consequently, the appellant requested the annulment of the injunctive order issued by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel on December 20, 2024, and served on January 3, 2025, insofar as it contains the following statements: "it is ordered ..., given the ascertained violation of the regulations governing the election campaign, the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate and transmission of the measure to the President of the Regional Council for the procedure within his competence as provided for by art. 15, paragraph 7, Law 515/93. WHEREFORE ... Considering the violations of the regulations, as indicated above, it orders the transmission of this injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council for matters within his competence concerning the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia ...".
1.1.– Through this act, the aforementioned Regional Panel, following the verification of the declaration and financial statement filed by Alessandra Todde, elected President of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia following the regional elections of February 25, 2024 (followed by the proclamation of the elected officials on March 20, 2024), imposed upon Ms. Todde the administrative sanction of EUR 40,000.00, "considering the multiplicity and relevance of the irregularities found, the total non-compliance with the regulations under Law 515/1993 and Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1/94", ordering its payment within thirty days of notification of the measure. Furthermore, it ordered the transmission of the injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council for matters within his competence "concerning the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia", as well as to the Public Prosecutor's Office regarding the anomalies found.
In its reasoning, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel – in response to the seven charges previously brought against Alessandra Todde, and after assessing the interested party's defense memorandum – deemed only charge number 6 to be superseded, while confirming all others, concerning the violation, under various aspects, of the discipline on election campaign expenditures, under art. 7, paragraphs 3, 4 and 6, of Law no. 515 of December 10, 1993 (Regulation of election campaigns for the election of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic), as referenced by art. 3, paragraph 1, of the Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of January 27, 1994 (Rules for the regulation, transparency and containment of expenditures for the election campaign for the election of the Regional Council and repeal of regional law May 16, 1984, no. 32).
Specifically, concerning charge number 1), related to the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement to the provisions of art. 7, paragraph 6, of Law no. 515 of 1993, the Panel noted that the expenditure declaration forms, originally sent by the candidate, indicated expenses amounting to EUR 90,629.98 and contributions received amounting to EUR 90,670.01. These forms, having been signed only by Alessandra Todde and accompanied by a financial statement of expenses and funding pertaining to a committee named "Electoral Committee of the M5S for the election of the President of the Region of Sardinia", were not suitable for clarifying whether the expenses related to the individual candidate for the presidency or to the election campaign of the councilor candidates supported by the aforementioned movement. With her defense memorandum, the Panel added, the interested party merely "disavowed what had already been asserted previously", declaring that she had not incurred any expenses; however, such a contradictory declaration would not be admissible under the law and, moreover, would not resolve the noted non-conformity, but rather raise "the further problem" of the truthfulness of the initial expenditure declarations.
Regarding charge number 2), the Panel found the failure to appoint a representative responsible, pursuant to art. 7, paragraphs 3 and 4, of Law no. 515 of 1993, for collecting funds for financing the election campaign and for recording and certifying the truthfulness of the operations carried out. In the instant case, moreover, to this non-sanable omission is added the circumstance that "the funding and expenses for electoral propaganda (as shown by the bank statement produced) are not attributable only to Todde's party, but also to other parties (PD and Sinistra Futura), thus distorting also the nature of the committee that allegedly financed her election campaign". The collection of funds, the Panel observed, has a broad scope, "which coincides with the Party's program and that of all affiliated candidates, but it cannot in any way be a tool to support all expenses referring only to a single candidate - as appears to have happened for candidate Todde". This, the Panel concluded, prejudices the principle of transparency which requires "identifying the authors of every single funding received by the candidate participating in the elections".
The foregoing, in the Panel's judgment, also confirms the validity of the further charges numbered 3), 4), 5) and 7), concerning, respectively, the failure to open a dedicated bank account, the failure to certify and sign the financial statement by the representative (never appointed, as already stated), the failure to produce the statement of the dedicated bank account, and the ambiguous fate of the "Paypal transactions" (concerning "16 funding/donations received for the election campaign"), referenced in the list produced by the candidate, regarding which it is not possible to know the bank account into which they flowed. Regarding this last point, Alessandra Todde's defensive statements, according to which these transactions would have flowed into the electoral committee's bank account, are not substantiated.
Finally, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel highlighted, as a further anomaly, "the presence in the tax drawer of an invoice addressed to candidate Todde – and never filed by her – relating to Enel expenses of 11.01.24 (Euro 153.16) for the premises located in Cagliari [...] which appears to have been rented by the aforementioned as the headquarters for her election campaign".
In light of the "irregularities found and violation of criminal provisions concerning the filing of contradictory declarations and the anomalies noted", the order concluded, "transmission of a copy of the aforementioned documents to the competent Public Prosecutor's Office is imposed, as well as the imposition of administrative sanctions and, finally, given the ascertained violation of the regulations governing the election campaign, the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate and transmission of the measure to the President of the Regional Council for the procedure within his competence as provided for by art. 15, paragraph 7, Law 515/93".
1.2.– In support of its appeal, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia alleges the violation of arts. 15, 35 and 50 of Constitutional Law no. 3 of February 26, 1948 (Special Statute for Sardinia), arts. 97 and 122 of the Constitution, and arts. 1 and 22 of Regional Statutory Law no. 1 of November 12, 2013 (Electoral Statutory Law pursuant to article 15 of the Special Statute for Sardinia).
The appellant proceeds from the twofold premise that the regional electoral guarantee panels have an administrative (and not jurisdictional) nature, as is evident from this Court's judgment no. 387 of 1996, and are also attributable "to the State legal system". The oversight regarding compliance with the regulations on electoral financial statements, in fact, constitutes "a function that expresses a unitary requirement of the Republican legal order". It is noted that these bodies, based on Law no. 515 of 1993, "are established within the judicial administration" and perform oversight and sanctioning functions regarding the elections for the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic. Art. 4, paragraph 1, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 then provided that the same panels perform these functions concerning the elections for the Regional Council of Sardinia. However, it cannot be held that the same body has a state nature when it oversees campaigns relating to national political elections and assumes, instead, a regional nature when it performs oversight functions on regional electoral competitions.
This established, the challenged injunctive order would have resulted in an impairment of the sphere of powers constitutionally assigned to the Autonomous Region of Sardinia. By ordering the forfeiture of the President of the Region, in fact, it would also imply "the anticipated dissolution of the Regional Council by virtue of the principle aut simul stabunt aut simul cadent, with the consequent calling of new presidential and council elections and with irreversible effects on the tenure of all other regional councilors, as well as the President and the Regional Executive". Hence the "constitutional tone" of the present conflict, initiated in defense of the powers statutorily attributed to the council body and to all other top bodies of the Region (where, it is emphasized, Alessandra Todde's different right to passive suffrage "can [be asserted] in another forum").
The challenged act would have constituted "a typical case of 'misuse' or 'abuse of power', which has unduly interfered in the 'sphere of constitutional competence' of the Region of Sardinia". The injury would derive immediately from the act, regardless of its contestability through ordinary remedies, or of its (supposed) non-immediately enforceable nature. Although referring the effect of forfeiture to a subsequent decision of the Regional Council (as, moreover, art. 5, paragraph 3, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 establishes), the injunctive order would have presumed the duty of the Council to comply with it, as can be inferred from reading the minutes no. 14 of the meeting of December 20, 2024. In this way, the challenged order would have acquired the characteristics, often indicated by constitutional jurisprudence, of an act which, "even if preparatory or non-final", is intended to clearly and unequivocally express the claim to exercise a specific competence whose exercise may determine an impairment of the possibilities of exercising the sphere of attribution of others (referring here, among others, to this Court's judgments no. 332 of 2011 and no. 89 of 2006, the latter having deemed even purely internal ministerial notes to be injurious and challengeable through conflict, if they contained a clear manifestation of intent regarding the attribution of competence).
The points of impairment alleged by the appellant Region materialize in three violations of law, relating to: a) a defect in the communication made pursuant to art. 15, paragraph 10, of Law no. 515 of 1993; b) the non-existence of the prerequisites for the sanction of forfeiture, and c) the incorrect qualification of the specific position of the President of the Region as a regional councilor.
As for the first alleged violation, the appellant premises that, according to art. 15, paragraph 10, of Law no. 515 of 1993, referenced by art. 5, paragraph 3, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, for the purpose of declaring forfeiture, must "communicate the final ascertainment of the violations referred to in paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 to the President of the Chamber of belonging of the parliamentarian, who pronounces the forfeiture according to its regulations". This communication – which, as regards regional elections, is addressed to the President of the Regional Council, as indicated by art. 5, paragraph 3, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 – should precisely identify the provisions that, in the instant case, lead to the sanction of forfeiture: and these provisions, the Region observes, cannot be exhausted in the reference to paragraph 7 of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, which in itself does not contemplate any case of forfeiture and which, rather, refers to the "cases expressly provided for in this article". The reference could only be to the cases of forfeiture specifically provided for by paragraphs 8 and 9 of the same art. 15, which concern, respectively, the failure to timely file the election expenditure declaration despite a formal notice to comply, and the exceeding of the maximum permitted expenditure limits by an amount equal to or greater than double. In the instant case, the communication sent to the President of the Regional Council, which merely referred to art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993, would be incomplete, as it made no mention of any of the violations indicated in the subsequent paragraphs 8 and 9.
As for point b) of the impairment, the Region observes that none of the charges brought against Alessandra Todde would fall under those that lead to forfeiture pursuant to the aforementioned paragraphs 8 and 9. Indeed, regarding the case under paragraph 8, the injunctive order even specified that "Ms. Todde was not charged at all with the failure to file the expenditure declaration and financial statement", but only with "the anomaly resulting from the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed by herself". With respect to the case under paragraph 9, the Region maintains that Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 offers no criteria to determine the limits for election expenditures of candidates for the Presidency of the Region, as it refers only to candidates for the Regional Council.
Finally, as for point c) of the impairment, the appellant asserts that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel made an erroneous interpretative assumption, having considered that Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 is also applicable to the President of the Region elected by universal and direct suffrage, as having a position comparable to that of a regional councilor. It is noted in the appeal that the aforementioned regional law dates back to a historical period in which the President of the Regional Executive was still elected by the Regional Council from among its members (based on the then-current art. 36, first paragraph, of the special autonomy statute) and, therefore, could not include the figure of the directly elected President (which characterizes the regional form of government in force today). Moreover, it is pointed out that, pursuant to art. 3, paragraph 2, of Constitutional Law no. 2 of January 31, 2001 (Provisions concerning the direct election of presidents of regions with special statutes and of the autonomous provinces of Trento and Bolzano), the President cannot today be equated to an elected regional councilor, "as he is elected to another body, namely the monocratic body called 'President of the Region'", this office being supported by an election system "different from that of regional councilors in various respects" (method of casting the vote; delimitation of the spatial scope of the candidacy, which coincides not with a single constituency, but with the entire regional territory).
Furthermore, the fact that the regional law on the accountability of election expenditures is not applicable to the President would also follow from the express provision of art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, according to which, in matters of ineligibility and incompatibility, "State laws" apply until the approval of a regional regulation pursuant to article 15 of the special statute. The reference to State laws would preclude a priori the applicability of the entire Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 and, in particular, of its articles 3 and 5, which in turn reference the provisions of articles 7 and 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993. For its part, art. 20 of the latter law, applicable conversely as a "State law" intended to regulate, on a transitional basis, the elections of the Sardinian Regional Council, does not include art. 7 among the provisions of the same law that are applicable to regional elections and, therefore, would not allow the extension to the Sardinian territory of the discipline on the limits of election expenditures laid down by Law no. 515 of 1993.
1.3.– In the alternative, should it be held that art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993 is applicable to the instant case and that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel acted by applying an autonomous forfeiture hypothesis, found in the same provision, the appellant Region requests that this Court refer the question of the constitutional legitimacy of the provision itself to its own review.
It is argued in this regard that the principle of reasonableness, under art. 3, first paragraph, of the Constitution, the principle of legality, derived from arts. 25 and 97 of the Constitution, the right to judicial defense, provided for by art. 24 of the Constitution, and the right to passive suffrage (art. 48 of the Constitution), are violated, as well as art. 117, first paragraph, of the Constitution, in relation to art. 6 of the European Convention on Human Rights and art. 47 of the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.
If the indicated paragraph 7 of art. 15 were to be understood as establishing an autonomous forfeiture hypothesis ("as, in fact, paragraph 10 of the same art. 15 would seem to suggest", it adds), this would be an "extremely serious" sanctioning measure, as it "affects the fundamental right to passive suffrage", in the face of a factual situation "described by the legislative provision in absolutely generic and indeterminate terms". The sanction of forfeiture under art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993 would indeed refer to the "violation of any and insufficiently identified regulation applicable to the conduct of election campaigns, even though the numerous laws in this matter [...] are already accompanied by specific sanctions, sometimes criminal, sometimes pecuniary, sometimes affecting the right to suffrage".
The question of constitutional legitimacy raised by the appellant would "certainly" be relevant for the decision, as, if the provision in question were declared constitutionally illegitimate, "it would be established that the State [...] was not entitled to declare the forfeiture of Engineer Todde".
As for the non-manifest unfoundedness, several aspects of contrast with the Constitution are highlighted.
It is observed, first of all, that the jurisprudence of this Court "has always censured legislative provisions sanctioning indeterminate and generic factual situations" (referencing, here, among others, judgment no. 110 of 2023), and this with regard not only to criminal matters but also to administrative sanctions that affect fundamental rights (such as passive suffrage, in this case). The causes of ineligibility should also be specified with sufficient precision, in order to avoid situations of uncertainty. In the instant case, the indeterminacy of the sanctioning factual situation "does not allow the recipient of the precept to have real knowledge of what the required conduct is in order not to fall into the sanctioned hypothesis", with a consequent violation of the aforementioned constitutional parameters.
Secondly, attention is focused on the particular cause of ineligibility provided for by the challenged provision, generically referring to the candidate who has violated the "regulations governing the election campaign". The category of ineligibility should, as a general rule, pre-exist the election in order to have invalidating effects, given that it affects the equality of conditions among the various candidates (as also affirmed by constitutional jurisprudence, which has drawn the consequent differences from this compared to the figure of incompatibility). Therefore, it would be improperly invoked in the instant case, which concerns the omitted or erroneous fulfillment of transparency obligations regarding funding and management of election expenses, and not "a personal condition pre-existing the election and, objectively, capable of conditioning the free manifestation of the electors' consent". Furthermore, other "blatant incongruities" are found, as it is not clear whether the ineligibility provided for by art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993 should be considered "absolute" (i.e., applicable to any elected office), or "relative" (as referring only to the office for which the elected person failed to comply with the rules on the election campaign), nor whether it applies only "pro-future" or also "pro-praeterito" (i.e., as "supervening ineligibility"). Ineligibility, in reality, could only be relative and temporary, otherwise it would transform into a wholly ablative cause (and not merely restrictive, as art. 48, last paragraph, of the Constitution allows) of the right to passive suffrage. In any case, the use of the institute in a sanctioning key "would distort its function [...] ontologically established as an anticipatory safeguard of the orderly conduct of the electoral competition", especially if the case in question is compared with the other hypotheses of ineligibility provided for by the legal system.
The appellant Region finally raises, "[a]s a completely subordinate matter," a further point of constitutional illegitimacy of art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993, insofar as it establishes that the ascertained violation of the rules on the election campaign "constitutes a cause of ineligibility", rather than "constitutes a cause of supervening ineligibility", and insofar as it provides that this ascertainment "entails the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate in the cases expressly provided for in this article with a resolution of the Chamber of belonging", rather than "entails the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate in the cases expressly provided for in this article if not removed within the reasonable time granted following notification made with a resolution of the Chamber of belonging". The "only possibility" of bringing the provision into conformity with the Constitution would, in fact, be a "additive/substitutive ruling", through which the category of ineligibility is treated "in accordance with the constitutional principles in the matter", which consider supervening ineligibility conditions "as hypotheses of incompatibility", characterized by granting the interested party "a fair and reasonable time to remove the obstacle to holding the munus publicum". This is in line with both the "fundamental principle", applicable also to regions with special autonomy, dictated by art. 2, paragraph 1, letter c), of Law no. 165 of July 2, 2004 (Provisions implementing article 122, first paragraph, of the Constitution), and with constitutional jurisprudence, which has repeatedly affirmed, precisely, the "obligation to grant a time limit in favor of the interested party to remove the cause of supervening ineligibility (to be regarded as incompatibility)".
2.– Riccardo Fercia intervened in the proceeding in opposition, as a member of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, an intervention which he subsequently declared to renounce during the public hearing for discussion.
3.– The Panel itself was constituted in the proceeding, which argued for the inadmissibility of the appeal on several grounds.
3.1.– Firstly, the challenged act would be attributable not to the State, but to the Autonomous Region of Sardinia itself. This is because, through art. 4, paragraph 1, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, it opted for the instrument of "administrative delegation", since the functions of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels have been assigned, for regional elections, to the same Panel competent for the elections of the Chamber and Senate. This body, therefore, while remaining "state", is called upon to adopt "regional" measures, attributable, that is, to the region "as the actual holder of the function concretely exercised by delegating a state office". Consequently, "the alleged conflict does not exist, simply because the appellant has challenged an act attributable to its own administration".
Furthermore, the immediacy of the alleged injury is lacking. The challenged order, in fact, would have been limited to imposing a pecuniary sanction, as would appear from its operative part, then transmitting the documents to the President of the Regional Council for matters within his competence (transmission equivalent to the duty to report, generally provided for administrative sanctions, by art. 17, third paragraph, of Law no. 689 of November 24, 1981, on "Amendments to the criminal system"). Nor can the expression "forfeiture is imposed [...]", contained in the reasoning of the measure in question, be interpreted " 'against the operative part' ".
This Court, in judgment no. 387 of 1996, clarified that the forfeiture resulting from the ascertainment of the violation by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel "follows directly, not from this final decision, but from the resolution of the Chamber of belonging", as provided by art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993.
Therefore, the Panel observes, while the pecuniary sanctions imposed by it are challengeable before the ordinary judge (through the opposition proceeding under art. 6 of Legislative Decree no. 150 of September 1, 2011, on "Complementary provisions to the Code of Civil Procedure regarding the reduction and simplification of civil cognition proceedings, pursuant to article 54 of Law no. 69 of June 18, 2009"), the forfeiture must be resolved by the Chamber of belonging of the elected candidate and, only then, as an "act of high administration and not political", the challenge before the administrative judge could be initiated. The jurisdiction of the latter (in the absence of autodichia by the body of belonging) would, moreover, be consistent with the nature of "legitimate interest" of the injured subjective position, that of the elected councilor, whose "subjective right" to passive suffrage would not at all be "weakened" by the forfeiture measure: if anything, following the ascertainment of the committed violations, that right would result as "exercised in incorrect terms" (due to the legal violations committed by the candidate), with the resulting "forfeiture" measure provided by law against which the interested party would have an "illegitimate interest irreducible to the subjective obstacles of ineligibility, incompatibility and inelectability".
In conclusion, according to the respondent party, the Region is "doubly 'in conflict with itself'": both because the challenged act would be attributable to it, due to "delegation", and because the forfeiture, not yet pronounced, will have to be decided by one of its bodies, the Regional Council.
3.2.– A further ground for inadmissibility is then highlighted with regard to the fact that, since the only body competent to declare the forfeiture has not yet ruled, the proceeding before this Court would concern "powers not yet exercised" (as they belong exclusively to the Regional Council) and would turn into "a sort of 'preventive consultation' [...] in order to release the current regional councilors from their institutional responsibilities and from judicial review": this again confirms the lack of immediacy of the present conflict.
3.3.– Again with regard to the held "inadmissibility" of the appeal, as an "elusive 'parallel appeal' of jurisdiction", the Panel emphasizes that its injunctive order could not go so far as to encroach upon the competence of the Regional Council regarding the qualification of the ascertained violations, noting rather how it " 'reports' to the Regional Council sub specie facti". For this reason, it abstained from subsuming these violations under any of the three hypotheses of forfeiture, provided for by paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993. Abstractly, however, there would be no doubt that the violation of the precepts on the election campaign, prescribed by that law, entails the effect of forfeiture of the elected candidate, as this Court also affirmed in judgment no. 387 of 1996: otherwise, those precepts "would ultimately be leges imperfectae, the violation of which by the candidate would be accompanied by the certainty of retaining the office in any case". The hypotheses of forfeiture provided for by art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993 would thus be "three, and not two", as paragraph 10 of the same art. 15 would also confirm.
From a second perspective, it is not true that the challenged order would have excluded the violation under paragraph 8 of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993 (failure to file the expenditure declaration and financial statement). Rather, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel – argues the intervener – would have contested Alessandra Todde for "the failure to file not in the material sense, but [...] in the legal sense, because the latter initially produced a declaration completely outside its constitutive requirements, moreover paradoxically 'self-contradicted', in a second moment, by an equal and opposite declaration".
Finally, a third point is addressed, concerning the alleged non-applicability of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 to the instant case. The premise from which the appeal proceeds, namely that the latter was repealed by Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, would not be correct: the repealing effect, to be traced back to the provisions of art. 15 of the Sardinian statute, should be considered limited, in fact, only to the causes of ineligibility and incompatibility referring to "institutional offices" and the "form of government of the Region" and, therefore, only to those of "general" scope (linked, that is, to the undue advantage that a candidate derives from holding a particular office, in violation of the electoral par condicio) and not also to those of "special" nature. The ineligibility entailing forfeiture, "understood as a restorative sanction", would thus remain entrusted to a lex specialis (precisely, Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994) which regulates regional election campaigns.
Moreover, the fact that the electoral expense reporting law is not applicable to the President would also follow from the express provision of art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, according to which, in matters of ineligibility and incompatibility, "State laws" apply until the approval of a regional regulation pursuant to art. 15 of the special statute. The reference to State laws would preclude a priori the applicability of the entire Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 and, in particular, of its articles 3 and 5, which in turn reference the rules under articles 7 and 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993. For its part, art. 20 of the latter law, conversely applicable as a "State law" intended to regulate, on a transitional basis, the elections of the Sardinian Regional Council, does not include art. 7 among the provisions of the same law that are applicable to regional elections and, therefore, would not allow the extension to the Sardinian territory of the discipline on the limits of election expenditures laid down by Law no. 515 of 1993.
3.4.– The Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel also critically reviews the request to this Court to refer the question of the constitutional legitimacy of art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993. Such a question – it is noted – could only be raised by the judge called to rule on the actual forfeiture measure, that is, the administrative judge, and only once the power has been exercised (by the Regional Council).
On the merits of the question raised, it is observed that the contested forfeiture provision would be "not only constitutionally compatible, but also constitutionally necessary". The feared dissolution of the council body, resulting from the forfeiture of the President of the Region, would be an immediate consequence of the statutory rule " simul stabunt, simul cadent", consistently provided for in the constitutional framework in force in the Region after the 2001 reform. The undue advantage enjoyed by the candidate elected to the highest regional government office during the election campaign cannot fail to result, as a "constitutional necessity", in the forfeiture "of the entire legislature": a sanction, the latter, to be considered "proportional to the gravity of the factual situation". The regulations governing the election campaign, ultimately, must be strictly complied with, "because the entire structure of the regional administration depends on that 'fair' election campaign".
4.– The President of the Council of Ministers and the Minister of Justice also constituted themselves in the proceeding, represented and defended by the State Attorney's Office, concluding for the rejection of the appeal of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia "as inadmissible".
Recalling the outcome of the checks carried out on the elected candidate by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, as subsequently incorporated into the injunctive order under challenge, the State defense first argues the lack of passive standing of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and the Ministry of Justice, "due to the non-jurisdictional, but administrative, nature of the Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari" (referencing again this Court's judgment no. 387 of 1996).
The "relationship of instrumentality" between the body that issued the challenged act and the State is not recognizable in the case at hand. Rather, this body – which nevertheless maintains a state nature "when it exercises its functions regarding the elections of the Italian Parliament" – in this case would have performed functions attributed to it by the Region of Sardinia itself, as a result of the provisions of art. 4, paragraph 1, of Regional Law no. 1 of 1994. Precisely because it concerns the oversight functions on regional campaigns, attributable to the subject matter (that of regulating the cases of ineligibility of the President of the Region) which art. 3, paragraph 1, of Constitutional Law no. 2 of 2001 attributes to the exclusive legislative competence of the Region of Sardinia, "public interests not unitary under article 5 of the Constitution, but purely autonomistic" would come into play.
Thus, the "prerequisite (inter)subjective of the raised conflict of attribution, namely the state nature of the body whose act is challenged," is lacking.
5.– In subsequent memoranda, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari presented further defenses in support of the conclusions already stated.
5.1.– In particular, with the memorandum filed on April 29, 2025, the respondent body returned to dwell on charge number 1) of the challenged injunctive order, relating to the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed on June 15, 2024, by candidate Alessandra Todde.
In order to correctly understand the meaning of the charge, it is relevant to note that the declaration was accompanied not by a financial statement signed by the candidate and countersigned by her representative (as required by art. 7, paragraph 6, last sentence, of Law no. 515 of 1993), but by "the financial statement of a third party, namely the 'Electoral Committee of the 5 Star Movement', not attributable to either a candidate or the party on whose lists [Alessandra Todde] was a candidate" (in fact, the statement is countersigned "by the Hon. Emiliano Fenu in his capacity as treasurer of the Committee"). This, the respondent Panel emphasizes, resulted in the "legal non-existence of the inseparable pair 'declaration-financial statement'". As it was accompanied by "someone else's financial statement", the expenditure declaration, although filed by the candidate, must be considered "legally non-existent because it lacked an essential requirement" and unsuitable for reconstructing the candidate's revenues and expenses: the factual situation of the "failure to file" the declaration, sanctioned by art. 15, paragraphs 5 and 8, of Law no. 515 of 1993 and challenged as such by the challenged act, was thus constituted. Following the charge, Alessandra Todde then rendered (on December 3, 2024) her second declaration, in which she stated that she had not incurred any expenses, a declaration which in any case would not relate to the party on whose lists she was a candidate, but to the aforementioned Electoral Committee.
In light of this, the respondent body specifies, the passage in the injunctive order (which the Region, in its appeal, misrepresented) where it reads that "Ms. Todde was not charged at all with the failure to file the expenditure declaration and financial statement" should be understood, but only with "the anomaly resulting from the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed by herself". By this, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel – which had significantly referenced the procedural steps of the formal notice and the granting of a fifteen-day period, as provided for by art. 15, paragraph 8, of Law no. 515 of 1993 – would have intended to contest the "failure to file [...] in the legal sense", and not "in the material sense", of the expenditure declaration, without intending, however, to rule on any of the three forfeiture hypotheses under paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993. In fact, it is for "only the Regional Council to subsume – that is, precisely 'to qualify legally' – the ascertained violations [...] into one (or more) of the three legal figures implying forfeiture".
The respondent Panel then proceeds to argue again the "regional" nature of the challenged measure and the applicability, to the instant case, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994.
5.2.– In a further and subsequent memorandum, filed on May 30, 2025, the same Panel – accompanying the judgment of the Court of Cagliari of May 28, 2025, no. 848, filed concurrently – presented new defenses, insisting on the inadmissibility or, in any case, on the merits, on the unfoundedness of the appeal.
The respondent party reports that, with the aforementioned judgment, the Court of Cagliari rejected the opposition to the injunctive order filed by Alessandra Todde. This, based on "three fundamental precedents in the matter", namely the recalled judgment no. 387 of 1996 of this Court, as well as the judgment of the Court of Cassation, sixth criminal section, no. 16781 of October 21, 2021 (already referenced in the previous defense memorandum), and the judgment of the Court of Cassation, second civil section, no. 9587 of April 13, 2017 (also filed by the party). The latter, in a case "identical" to the one at hand, affirmed the legal principle that the filing of documents objectively unsuitable for reconstructing the revenues and expenditures of the election campaign of the candidates is equivalent to the material failure to file the financial statement under art. 7, paragraph 6, of Law no. 515 of 1993. In that case as well – the respondent party continues – it happened that the candidate, sanctioned by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel "as if she had filed nothing, attached unsigned accounts, for certification, by the electoral representative, as well as lacking the legal documentation, concerning the indispensable opening of a dedicated bank account, with the related statements". Even more serious, however, would be Alessandra Todde's current position, who would have "even attached someone else's financial statement".
The injunctive order challenged herein, as also confirmed by the Court of Cagliari, would therefore be "systematically consistent with perfectly conforming case law of legitimacy".
It is reiterated that, in the present case, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, in transmitting its measure to the Regional Council, had "no duty to legally qualify the ascertained violations for the purpose of the forfeiture resolution, exactly as the public official transmitting a notitia criminis to the Public Prosecutor pursuant to art. 331 of the Code of Criminal Procedure does not have to legally qualify the alleged crimes".
5.– The Autonomous Region of Sardinia also presented further defenses with a memorandum filed on June 17, 2025. Preliminarily, the Region objects to the inadmissibility of the constitution in judgment of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, primarily due to the lack of a defense mandate. The aforementioned body, in fact, as a state body, should have made use of the representation of the State Attorney's Office, pursuant to art. 1 of Royal Decree no. 1611 of October 30, 1933 (Approval of the consolidated text of laws and legal norms on the representation and defense in judgment of the State and on the organization of the State Attorney's Office). Furthermore, its constitution in judgment and the conferral of the mandate to lawyer Riccardo Fercia "do not even appear to have been resolved by the collegiate body", the necessary authorization resolution not emerging from the documents. As this is a perfect collegiate body, the mandate conferred by its President alone would not even be sufficient, to be considered "void due to lack of power of the mandator". Moreover, in this proceeding, the President of that Panel did not appear in person, so the constitution of the body could not even be considered valid pursuant to the last paragraph of art. 37 of Law no. 87 of March 11, 1953 (Rules on the constitution and functioning of the Constitutional Court).
The thesis of the State Attorney's Office – according to which the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, while structurally a state administrative body, could assume a regional nature whenever it performs acts attributable to the regional administration – is also contested. The appellant reconstructs the current legislative framework in the matter and its historical evolution, emphasizing the "peculiar value" of Law no. 515 of 1993, aimed at "guaranteeing the free and personal exercise of the right to active suffrage of citizens, in implementation of the principles expressed by art. 48 of the Constitution". It is therefore reiterated that "[t]he protection of the exercise of the right to vote (a fundamental right in a democracy) and, therefore, the related implementing discipline, is a state function and certainly not a regional one, since regions lack legislative power in the matter". It is added that "even oversight on regional and local election campaigns constitutes an expression of a function preordained to the protection of a unitary public interest of pressing constitutional relevance, as it is aimed at protecting the right to vote, i.e., a fundamental constitutional value that must be ensured both as a subjective right and as an objective norm of principle (also having an institutional dimension) on the occasion of every election campaign". Under the previous formulation of Title V of Part Two of the Constitution, Law no. 515 of 1993 implicitly left regions the power to establish expenditure limits for regional election campaigns. In fact, art. 7 of the aforementioned law was (and is) parameterized on political elections. The Region of Sardinia provided (with Regional Law no. 1 of 1994) to establish discipline in this regard, thus exercising the competence attributed to it by art. 5, letter d), of the special statute. However, the appellant specifies, the Sardinian legislator could not have "departed from the general regulatory framework established by State Law no. 515 of 1993 and entrusted oversight functions to a body other than the Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari".
As further confirmation, it is noted that, as regards regional elections, art. 20, paragraph 1, of Law no. 515 of 1993 makes articles 1 to 6 (and the related sanctions provided for in art. 15) and arts. 17, 18 and 19 of the same law applicable: art. 7 (which, in fact, regulates the limits and publicity of election expenses of candidates for parliamentary elections only) and art. 13 (establishing the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels) are not mentioned. From this, however, the conclusion that these Panels cannot be operational for the control of regional elections (and related election campaigns) cannot be drawn: on the contrary, this would be an aspect not available to the regional legislator. The conclusion is that "the oversight and sanctioning functions on the occasion of regional elections are specifically state because attributed to the Regional Guarantees Panel by art. 20 of Law no. 515 of 1993 (in conjunction with art. 15, paragraph 7, which also refers to arts. 1-6 of the same law) and not by art. 4 of Regional Law no. 1 of 1994 and, above all, because they safeguard the right to vote under art. 48 of the Constitution, i.e., a fundamental right whose guarantee is primarily and directly the responsibility of the State (understood, above all, as the 'State apparatus')".
In this framework, art. 4 of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 would merely reproduce the overriding state discipline just mentioned. The hypothesis of delegation, supported by the opposing parties, an institution otherwise in force in the framework of the previous Title V but foreign to the current constitutional framework, would therefore be implausible. Moreover, even if it were to be held that, in the instant case, the competence of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia derives not from the statute, but from the amended Title V (by virtue of the so-called "favorable clause", under art. 10 of Constitutional Law no. 3 of October 18, 2001, on "Amendments to Title V of Part Two of the Constitution"), it is noted that "art. 118 of the Constitution prevents the regional legislator from unilaterally establishing to entrust regional administrative tasks to state offices", as the regional legislator is not allowed to carry out "a 'call for subsidiarity' of regional administrative functions by making them ascend beyond the regional level to place them at the state level".
Finally, it is noted that even the Court of Cagliari, in ruling, with judgment no. 848 of May 28, 2025, on the opposition proceeding initiated by Alessandra Todde against the pecuniary sanction, while incidentally affirming the regional nature of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, would nevertheless have emphasized the " 'direct' applicability to Sardinian regional elections of Law no. 515 of 1993 ('direct', therefore, without the intermediation of Regional Law no. 1 of 1994), thus confirming the entirely state nature of the powers exercised by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel".
On the merits of the conflict, the appellant Region returns to support the thesis of the immediate injuriousness of the challenged injunctive order. It is emphasized that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel itself, in its defensive submissions before the Court of Cagliari, had taken a "clear" position "on the 'binding' or 'due' nature of the council resolution forfeiting Engineer Todde from the office of President of the Region". Moreover, the "character" and "nature" of the determination adopted by the Panel would be "peremptory" and would leave no room for the Regional Council.
7.– On June 18, 2025, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari also filed a further defense memorandum, replying to the exceptions raised by the appellant Region.
Regarding the alleged lack of a defense mandate, the Panel notes that, pursuant to art. 11, paragraph 5, letter a), of Presidential Decree no. 382 of July 11, 1980 (Reorganization of university teaching, related category and organizational and didactic experimentation), lawyers enrolled in the special list of full-time university professors "can certainly assume the defense and representation in judgment of State administrations", as ruled by the Court of Cassation (Civil United Sections, judgment no. 12874 of July 12, 2004, already cited by the appellant Region itself, is referenced). Furthermore, it is emphasized that lawyer Riccardo Fercia (counsel for the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel), based on that "lex specialis", would be "invested with the same ius postulandi that the lex generalis under art. 5 of Royal Decree of October 30, 1933, no. 1611, grants to the State Attorney's Office". Therefore, even if one were to assume, "absurdly", that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel is a state administration even when it controls the elections of the Regional Council, it would be "indisputable" that the body made use of counsel "who, by lex specialis, can certainly assume the defense and representation in judgment of a State Administration". Moreover, a precedent of the Court of Cassation would yield the principle that "those enrolled in the special list, having 'the necessary qualification to exercise the office of counsel with power of attorney before the competent judge' (art. 86 Code of Civil Procedure and 22, paragraph 3, Code of Administrative Procedure), even if only for public bodies, are de plano authorized also for the defense of themselves".
As for the failure to file, in this constitutional proceeding, the resolution of April 3, 2025, with which the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel conferred the defense mandate on lawyer Riccardo Fercia – a failure to file which is the subject of a specific inadmissibility exception raised by the appellant Region with the memorandum referred to above – the reply is that this would be due to an "omissive inertia" of the recording official, who would not have proceeded to draw up the relevant minutes. Moreover, the nature of a perfect collegiate body of the body in question would only exist when it proceeds to evaluations concerning electoral operations, while "no law, especially with reference to Law no. 515 of 1993, provides that its resolution is a constitutive requirement of a power of attorney ad litem".
It is then complained that the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, by filing the parallel appeal for conflict of attribution (registered under no. 5 of conflicts between public entities for 2025), resulting from the motion of June 12, 2025, and concerning the judgment of rejection issued by the Court of Cagliari, would have engaged in dilatory conduct, aimed at obtaining, through the postponement of the decision of this Court, a "procedural standstill".
Turning to the merits of the conflict, the respondent party maintains that the source of constitutional rank, "underpinning Regional Law no. 1 of 1994", should be found in art. 16 of the autonomy statute. The literal wording in force in 1994 of this provision, in fact, "expressly reserved to regional law [...] any aspect of the discipline applicable to the elections for the Regional Council of Sardinia". At that historical moment, the regional legislator could choose "between the creation of its own oversight body and the delegation of a state body for the performance of its own administrative activity", ultimately opting for the latter solution. It is true – the Panel observes – that the vote constitutes an interest of constitutional relevance, "but if it concerns the vote to which citizens are called for the election of the Sardinian Regional Council, the Special Statute, as an undeniably constitutional norm, draws the law and the related secondary implementation, including obviously the resulting administrative measures, into the orbit of the Region's autonomy". In this framework, forfeiture as a restorative sanction, parallel to the pecuniary one, would remain "still regulated by the lex specialis of 1994", without being "superseded" by art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, which refers, as a lex generalis, only to the nullity-invalidity of the election due to violation of the electoral par condicio and to forfeiture due to cessation of duties. The fact that this provision references "State laws" "implies de plano the full application of (only) Law no. 515 of 1993".
In any case, "the clear lack of interest in the granting of the request made in this proceeding emerges, in which the substantive appellant is undoubtedly the same subject who filed the appeal, based on overlapping grounds, also before the Court".
8.– On July 24, 2025, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia also filed in the proceeding the "Declaration Model for acceptance of candidacy for the office of President of the Region", completed and signed by Alessandra Todde, on January 24, 2024, pursuant to art. 13, paragraph 4, of the Regional Law of Sardinia of July 26, 2013, no. 16, on "Administrative organization of the procedure and voting for the election of the President of the Region and the Regional Council. Amendments to Regional Law no. 7 of March 6, 1979 (Rules for the election of the Regional Council)".
The model reads the declaration, signed and authenticated, by Alessandra Todde of acceptance of candidacy for the office of President of the Region, with reference to the elections scheduled for February 25, 2024, accompanied by the further declaration by the same "of not having presented herself as a candidate for the office of regional councilor".
9.– With a memorandum filed on July 25, 2025, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel replied to this documentary filing, asserting that, with these declarations, Alessandra Todde had in fact only accepted the rules of candidacy in the single regional constituency, imposed by Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, specifically by its arts. 1, paragraphs 3, 4 and 5, 3, paragraph 2, and 7, paragraphs 1 and 2. From the set of the aforementioned provisions it can be inferred that, following the elections for the President of the Region, organized on the basis of a single regional constituency, "the first-placed becomes President of the Region and Regional Councilor; the second, instead, a 'simple' Councilor; if there are more than two candidates, the further placed in the single constituency do not obtain seats, nor can they use the hypothetical 'parachute' constituted by concurrent candidacy in a constituency list for this purpose". With her second declaration, candidate Alessandra Todde would therefore have accepted this latter "rule", i.e., "to be excluded from the Regional Council if she were to place third".
10.– With a subsequent note, filed on August 3, 2025, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel presented submissions regarding the held inadmissibility of the appeal lodged by Alessandra Todde against the aforementioned judgment no. 848 of 2025 of the Court of Cagliari.
The ground for inadmissibility of the appeal would lie in the fact that "the citation contains only the criticism of the judgment, not also the re-proposal of the grounds of opposition to the injunctive order challenged only in the first instance". The appeal, in fact, "contains the grounds of appeal, but does not re-propose the grounds of the appeal against the administrative order originally challenged (with multiple grounds) only before the Court of Cagliari, not also on appeal". The assumption would be confirmed by a judgment of the Council of State, fifth section, February 29 (recte: March 11) 2024, no. 2335, according to whose summary, "in matters of appeal against judgments of the administrative judge, the appellant who intends to contest a first-instance judgment that has declared the grounds of the main appeal absorbed or not examined, has the burden to expressly re-propose in appeal, pursuant to art. 101 paragraph 2 of the CPA, the grounds of censure against the originally challenged administrative measure, especially if it is a measure with multiple grounds".
It is added that art. 101, paragraph 2, of Annex 1 (Code of Administrative Procedure) to Legislative Decree no. 104 of July 2, 2010 (Implementation of article 44 of Law no. 69 of June 18, 2009, on delegation to the government for the reorganization of the administrative procedure), would contain a provision "less stringent than art. 346 of the Code of Civil Procedure, as interpreted by Cass. civ., united sections, March 21, 2019, no. 7940". In fact, while the former refers to claims and exceptions "declared absorbed or not examined in the first-instance judgment", the latter more broadly requires the re-proposal of those "not accepted in the first-instance judgment": it would follow that the orientation of administrative jurisprudence, set out in the pronouncement just recalled, would be "a fortiori applicable also to the forfeiture under art. 346 of the Code of Civil Procedure".
Therefore, it should be concluded that the judgment of the Court of Cagliari, "apart from formal res judicata, has attained substantive res judicata, with all the consequent effects".
11.– With a further defense memorandum, filed on August 4, 2025, the same Panel communicated the appeal filed by Alessandra Todde against judgment no. 848 of 2025 of the Court of Cagliari and the response memorandum, with cross-appeal, by the same Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel.
12.– With a memorandum filed on August 29, 2025, the State Attorney's Office, on behalf of the President of the Council of Ministers and the Minister of Justice, presented further defenses in reply to the arguments of the appellant Region.
Recalling the exception of lack of passive standing of the State bodies, already raised in its constitution memorandum, the State defense reiterates the thesis – preparatory to the exception of inadmissibility of the appeal – according to which the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel would not have a state nature.
It is observed in this regard in the memorandum that the regional legislative power in matters of voting rights – which currently has a concurrent nature, pursuant to art. 122, first paragraph, of the Constitution (this Court's judgment no. 151 of 2012 is referenced) – for the Region of Sardinia, at the time of the approval of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, should be considered "primary" or "full", and this "on the basis of specific Statutory Provisions of Sardinia" (art. 16 of the special statute, in the wording in force in 1994, is mentioned). Moreover, the matter of the "election system" would be such as to include the discipline concerning the election campaigns for the renewal of the Regional Councils and the reimbursement, where provided, of expenses incurred by political movements and parties, as clarified by this Court in judgment no. 151 of 2012. Sardinian autonomy in the matter would have been expressed through the provisions of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, which cannot be understood as a mere recognition of state oversight and sanctioning functions (which art. 20 of Law no. 515 of 1993 entrusts to the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel).
Art. 79 of the Law of the Autonomous Region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia of December 18, 2007, no. 28 (Regulation of the procedure for the election of the President of the Region and the Regional Council), is referenced in support, which established, in paragraph 1, the body named "Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel" attached to the Regional Council, providing, in paragraph 2, that it is established "by decree of the President of the Region" and attributing to it, for regional elections, the oversight functions belonging "to the Panel 'structurally state' established at the Court of Appeal of Trieste". This, in the opinion of the State defense, confirms "that, in the matter, Regions have 'power of choice'": the Autonomous Region of Sardinia "could also have established an 'ad hoc' Guarantees body", while remaining free to delegate (as it did) to the Panel structurally established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari for the exercise of the control function over the financial statements of candidates for the regional council elections.
It would follow that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, despite being established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, "performs functions as a body of the Region of Sardinia, since its role of control over the financial statements of expenses of candidates for the Regional Council was expressly attributed by Regional Law no. 1 of 1994, and not by a state source". This Panel would therefore constitute "a body of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia by direct regional legal basis": in fact, it "operates within the scope of regional elections and, last but not least, is financed through a specific chapter of the regional budget as provided by the same Regional Law no. 1/1994, art. 4, paragraph 3" (the latter aspect would confirm its financial dependence also on the regional administration, "according to the principle that 'ubi onus ibi potestas'").
13.– With a memorandum, filed on September 3, 2025, the appellant Autonomous Region of Sardinia also presented further defenses.
The Region, first of all, criticizes the thesis – supported by the State defense – according to which, at the time of the approval of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, the legislative power attributed to the Region of Sardinia, in electoral matters, should have been considered "primary" or "full". On the contrary, according to the appellant, it was only a "divided" competence, as also supported by the doctrine of the time and as would also be confirmed by this Court's judgment no. 26 of 1965.
These aspects, moreover, would be intertwined with the "problem of the relationship between the state role and the regional role in the protection of fundamental political rights". In this context, the discipline on election expenses (and related oversight functions) should be placed, which would constitute "an expression of a function preordained to the protection of a unitary public interest of pressing constitutional relevance, as it is aimed at protecting the right to vote". In this regard, the judgment (invoked by the State defense) no. 115 of 2012 (recte: 151 of 2012), which concerned only regions with ordinary statutes, would be irrelevant. This ruling would have emphasized the breadth of the notion of "election system" (under art. 122 of the Constitution) not certainly to recognize extensive electoral competence in favor of the regions, but only "for the purpose of accrediting the particular pervasiveness of the fundamental principles of state law in matters of regional elections".
The reference to art. 79 of Law of the Autonomous Region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia no. 28 of 2007 would also be irrelevant, from which "no conclusions can certainly be drawn regarding the validity of the content of a law of another Region or regarding the correct delimitation of its sphere of competence". Moreover, the referenced law of the Autonomous Region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia, as "statutory", could not be compared to Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994, which predates the 2001 statutory reform, considering that, according to the Region, the present issue is solely about what the legislator could have provided under the previous regional form of government.
In conclusion, it should be reiterated that "the Sardinian legislator of 1994 could not legitimately attribute oversight functions over election expenditures to a body other than the CRGE established by the state legislator", thus confirming the state nature of said body.
14.– On September 3, 2025, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari also filed a defense memorandum.
In the memorandum, arguments are advanced in support of the thesis (most recently maintained in the defenses of the State Attorney's Office) according to which the legislative power of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, in the matter of regional elections, should be considered "primary" or "full". In this regard, the particularity of the precedent under this Court's judgment no. 26 of 1965 (invoked by the appellant Region) is emphasized, and it is underlined that the system of reporting expenses of candidates and parties, with regard to regional elections, must be included – based on judgment no. 151 of 2012 – in the "election system" of regions with ordinary statutes: it should therefore be deduced that "a fortiori the exclusive competence that art. 16 of the Sardinian statute recognized to the appellant includes [...] also that specific area of the matter", with the resulting "coverage" of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994. In the previous constitutional order of the regions, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, pursuant to art. 16 of its special statute, "could indeed, at that historical moment, not only legislate to avoid the full suppletive application of state norms [...], but also [...] choose between the creation of its own oversight body (as Friuli Venezia Giulia did in 2007) and the delegation of a state body for the exercise of its own administrative activity".
The administrative nature of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel is then reaffirmed, and the memorandum returns to support the thesis of "delegation": the inadmissibility of the appeal would follow "de plano from the fact that the Authority is relevant, for regional elections, as a body of regional rank by delegation provided for by art. 4 of Regional Law no. 1 of 1994".
In Law Considered
1.– The Autonomous Region of Sardinia (conflict between public entities no. 2 of 2025) has brought a conflict of attribution against the State (and, for it, the Presidency of the Council of Ministers), the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel attached to the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, and the Ministry of Justice, in the person of the acting Minister, concerning the injunctive order, issued on December 20, 2024, by the same Panel, requesting that this Court declare that it was not within the competence of the State and, for it, the aforementioned Panel, to "impose 'the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate' as President of the Region, and to order by 'injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council ... the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia'", and, consequently, to partially annul the aforementioned injunctive order.
1.1.– The appellant alleges "points of impairment" of its powers, as derived from arts. 15, 35 and 50 of the special autonomy statute, arts. 97 and 122 of the Constitution, and arts. 1 and 22 of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013. The imposition of the forfeiture of the elected President, in fact, would also imply, pursuant to arts. 35 and 50 of the special statute, "the anticipated dissolution of the Regional Council by virtue of the principle aut simul stabunt aut simul cadent, with the consequent calling of new presidential and council elections and with irreversible effects on the tenure of all other regional councilors, as well as the President and the Regional Executive". Hence the "constitutional tone" of the present conflict, as well as the abuse of power attributed to the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, resulting from multiple violations of law, which are articulated in three different grounds of challenge.
The Region first identifies a defect in communication, pursuant to art. 15, paragraph 10, of Law no. 515 of 1993, which requires the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel to "communicate the final ascertainment of the violations referred to in paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 to the President of the Chamber of belonging of the parliamentarian, who pronounces the forfeiture according to its regulations". It notes, in this regard, that the communication of the order in question, like the measure itself, in outlining the ascertained violations and the related sanctioning regime, only referenced paragraph 7 of art. 15, "without making any mention of paragraphs 8 and 9", the only ones that – in the opinion of the appellant Region – identify the factual situations for the forfeiture of the elected candidate. Paragraph 7, instead, generally references the "violation of the regulations governing the election campaign" and, therefore, would not be a provision identifying a precise cause of forfeiture.
From another perspective, the appeal complains of the lack of prerequisites for the declaration of forfeiture. None of the charges brought against the elected candidate, in fact, would fall within the factual situations indicated in paragraphs 8 and 9 of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, the only provisions that provide for cases of forfeiture. It is pointed out that, indeed, in a passage of the reasoning, the order stated that "Ms. Todde was not charged at all with the failure to file the expenditure declaration and financial statement" (a factual situation outlined, as a cause of forfeiture, by paragraph 8 of art. 15), but only with "the anomaly resulting from the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed by herself".
Finally, the appeal challenges the erroneous interpretative assumption made by the collegiate body. The challenged measure applied the discipline on the limits and publicity of election expenditures of candidates, with the related forfeiture provisions, under art. 7 and art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, as referenced, for regional elections, by arts. 3, paragraph 1, and 5, paragraph 3, of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994. However, the referenced regional provisions, which refer only to the elections of regional councilors, would not be applicable to the case at hand, concerning the different election of the President of the Region, who is not an elected regional councilor, but is elected to another body of the Region (the President, precisely) and only in this capacity becomes a member of the Regional Council.
The non-applicability of the provisions of the aforementioned Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 would be confirmed by the express provision of art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, which, for the discipline of ineligibility and incompatibility, refers to "State laws". This normative reference would preclude the applicability of the regional law of 1994, both directly and, in the second instance, of Law no. 515 of 1993 itself, given that the latter expressly indicated which of its provisions are applicable also to regional elections (art. 20), not including the aforementioned ones.
1.2.– In the event that art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993 should be considered applicable to the present case, as the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel did, and this provision should be interpreted as containing an autonomous hypothesis of forfeiture, in addition to those indicated in paragraphs 8 and 9 of the same art. 15, the appellant Region has alternatively raised a question of constitutional legitimacy concerning the same paragraph 7, requesting this Court to refer it to its review. This question would "certainly" be relevant for the decision, as, if the provision in question were declared constitutionally illegitimate, "it would be established that the State [...] was not entitled to declare the forfeiture of Engineer Todde".
The ascertained points of constitutional illegitimacy would derive from the violation of the principle of reasonableness, under art. 3, first paragraph, of the Constitution, the principle of legality, under arts. 25 and 97 of the Constitution, the right to defense, under art. 24 of the Constitution, and the right to passive suffrage ("arts. 48 and 2 of the Constitution"), as well as the violation of art. 117, first paragraph, of the Constitution, in relation to art. 6 ECHR and art. 47 of the CFRFE. This, first of all, due to the indeterminacy of the sanctioning factual situation, as the provision, with the generic reference to violations of the discipline on the election campaign, "does not allow the recipient of the precept to have real knowledge of what the required conduct is in order not to fall into the sanctioned hypothesis". Secondly, the one in question cannot be attributed to the catalog of causes of ineligibility (even if defined as such by the challenged provision), because it refers to a personal condition not pre-existing the election and not even capable of conditioning the free manifestation of the electors' consent.
1.3.– In a further subordinate capacity, the appellant Region alleges the constitutional illegitimacy of art. 15, paragraph 7, of Law no. 515 of 1993 insofar as it establishes that the ascertained violation of the rules on the election campaign "constitutes a cause of ineligibility", rather than "constitutes a cause of supervening ineligibility", and insofar as it provides that this ascertainment "entails the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate in the cases expressly provided for in this article with a resolution of the Chamber of belonging", rather than "entails the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate in the cases expressly provided for in this article if not removed within the reasonable time granted following notification made with a resolution of the Chamber of belonging".
The alleged constitutional breach would derive, in this case, from the violation of the principles of equality and reasonableness, under art. 3, first paragraph, of the Constitution, the principle of legality ("under arts. 25 and 97 of the Constitution"), as well as the violation of arts. 2 and 48 of the Constitution and, as an "interposed source containing general principles under art. 122, first paragraph, of the Constitution", the violation of art. 2, paragraph 1, letter c), of Law no. 165 of 2004.
In the Region's view, the one in question constitutes a cause of "supervening" ineligibility and, as such, should be placed in the category of causes of incompatibility, from which it should borrow the legal regime. In fact, supervening ineligibility conditions should be treated as incompatibilities, characterized by granting the interested party "a fair and reasonable time to remove the obstacle to holding the munus publicum".
2.– The exceptions raised by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia regarding the inadmissibility of the constitution in the proceeding of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel must be addressed preliminarily.
The appellant first alleges the lack of a defense mandate, since, it is noted, the respondent body made use of the defense of a lawyer in private practice, in violation of the rule that, for the defense in judgment of State administrations, even if organized with an autonomous order, the mandatory representation by the State Attorney's Office is established (art. 1 of Royal Decree no. 1611 of 1933).
A further ground for inadmissibility would be found in the lack of the collegiate resolution authorizing the constitution in judgment and conferring the relevant mandate on the defense counsel. The Region notes in this regard that this resolution was not filed in the proceeding. Moreover, it is objected that the special mandate of the counsel was conferred only by the acting President of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel and not also by the collegiate body.
2.1.– None of these exceptions are well-founded.
2.1.1.– It must first be stated that, pursuant to art. 27 of the Supplementary Rules for proceedings before the Constitutional Court, in proceedings for a conflict of attribution between the State and regions, the appeal must be served, in addition to the President of the Council of Ministers or the President of the Regional Executive, also "upon the body that issued the act, when it concerns an authority other than government authorities or authorities dependent on the Government". In the instant case, therefore, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel, as the body that issued the act object of this proceeding and which is distinct from and not dependent on the Government (this aspect will be returned to below, at point 4), constitutes a necessary party, which must be placed in the position "to assert the reasons for the legitimacy of the challenged act, adopted by it, autonomously from the respondent President of the Council of Ministers" (judgments no. 43 of 2019 and no. 252 of 2013).
Pursuant to art. 37, last paragraph, of Law no. 87 of 1953, State bodies, when they are parties in conflicts of attribution between powers, may be defended and represented by private professionals qualified to practice before the higher courts and may also limit themselves to appearing – and constituting themselves – personally. This provision, although not directly referring to proceedings for a conflict of attribution between the State and regions (for which, in fact, it is not referenced, among the applicable norms, by art. 41 of Law no. 87 of 1953), expresses a rule that the jurisprudence of this Court has considered valid also for this type of conflict, regarding which it has affirmed that "a State body, endowed with autonomy, may be defended – in addition to by the State Attorney's Office (as in the proceeding under judgment no. 2 of 2007) – also by lawyers in private practice [...] no differently than in proceedings for conflict between State powers" (judgment no. 43 of 2019, point 2.2. of the Facts Considered).
In fact, "the general standard of art. 20 of Law no. 87 of 1953" applies (judgment no. 43 of 2019), according to which, in proceedings before this Court, the representation and defense of the parties may only be entrusted to lawyers qualified to practice before the Court of Cassation (first paragraph), with the specification that "[t]he bodies of the State and the Regions have the right to intervene in the proceeding" (second paragraph) and that "The Government [...] is represented and defended by the State Attorney General" (third paragraph). In the present case, the wording of the second paragraph – to be coordinated with that of the first and third paragraphs – is particularly relevant, which establishes that – unlike what is provided for the Government, represented by the State Attorney General (third paragraph), and for the other parties, whose representation and defense may only be entrusted to lawyers qualified to practice before the Court of Cassation (first paragraph) – "professional defense is not required" for the bodies of the State and the Regions (judgment no. 163 of 2005; previously, also judgment no. 350 of 1998).
It must therefore be concluded that, even with regard to proceedings for a conflict of attribution between the State and regions, the law introduced an exception to the general rule, otherwise valid for all State administrations, of mandatory representation by the State Attorney's Office, under art. 1 of Royal Decree no. 1611 of 1933. Limited to the constitutional process, this rule is maintained only for the intervention in the proceeding of the Government, in the person of the President of the Council of Ministers or a minister delegated by him (art. 20, third paragraph, of Law no. 87 of 1953), while, for all other State administrations, the defense may be entrusted to lawyers in private practice, provided they are qualified to practice before the Court of Cassation (art. 20, first paragraph), without prejudice to the fact that State and Regional bodies may also make use of personal defense (as derived from the second paragraph).
The exception that noted the lack of a defense mandate on the part of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel due to the lack of technical representation and defense by the State Attorney's Office is therefore not well-founded.
2.1.2.– In relation to the further point of non-regularity of the constitution in judgment of the respondent collegiate body, objected to by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia – and related to the alleged non-existence of a collegiate resolution of the same body concerning its constitution in judgment and the conferral of the mandate to lawyer Riccardo Fercia – it must first be noted the lack, among the documents filed by the parties, of the authorization resolution.
As correctly noted by the appellant, the special power of attorney signed by the acting President of the Panel and issued to lawyer Riccardo Fercia on April 4, 2025 expressly references "the resolution of the Panel dated April 3, 2025". It should also be noted that the filing of the authorization resolution is not necessary, in proceedings for a conflict of attribution between the State and regions, for parties other than the President of the Regional Executive, the only one for whom art. 39, third paragraph, of Law no. 87 of 1953 makes reference to this formality. In fact, the Supplementary Rules, in art. 27, paragraph 4, establish that "[t]he respondent party constitutes itself in the proceeding pursuant to art. 26, paragraph 4", thus referencing only the obligation of "electronic filing of a document containing the counter-arguments and conclusions". None of the aforementioned provisions, therefore, requires the filing of the authorization resolution.
Therefore, it must be concluded that the exception raised by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia is not well-founded even with regard to the point just examined.
2.1.3.– Finally, regarding the further point raised by the appellant, concerning the alleged irregularity of the defense mandate, issued, in favor of the counsel for the respondent body, by a non-collegiate act but originating from the President of the Panel alone, it is observed that the latter, as the legal representative of the Panel, had the power to execute its will, as derived from the resolution of April 3, 2025, and to proceed, consequently, with the material conferral of the defense assignment.
2.2.– In conclusion, the procedural exceptions of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, relating to the constitution in judgment of the body that issued the challenged act, must be dismissed as unfounded, with the consequent admissibility of the constitution in judgment of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel and the regularity of the defense presented by it.
3.– Also preliminarily, the exception raised by the State Attorney's Office regarding the lack of passive standing to resist in this proceeding, both of the Presidency of the Council of Ministers and of the Minister of Justice, authorities upon whom the Autonomous Region of Sardinia served its appeal, must be considered.
3.1.– The exception is well-founded only with regard to the summoning to judgment of the Minister of Justice.
While acknowledging that the Minister of Justice cannot, in principle, be a party to a conflict between the State and regions, the provision of art. 27 of the Supplementary Rules is again relevant, according to which the appeal for conflict of attribution between the State and regions must be served, in addition to the President of the Council of Ministers or the President of the Regional Executive, also "upon the body that issued the act, when it concerns an authority other than government authorities or authorities dependent on the Government". It seems beyond doubt in the present case that the challenged act was issued by an authority, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, which is distinct from the Government and not dependent on it.
The Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels, in fact, based on what is provided by the source that established them (art. 13 of Law no. 515 of 1993), operate at the Court of Appeal or, in its absence, at the Court of the capital of each region and are composed, respectively, of the President of the Court of Appeal or the Court, who chairs it, and six other members appointed by the same President for a renewable term of four years only once. The members, including substitute members, are appointed, for half, from among ordinary magistrates and, for the other half, from among those enrolled for at least ten years in the register of chartered accountants or among full-time university professors in legal, administrative or economic subjects (art. 13, paragraph 1). For the performance of its functions, the Panel uses the personnel serving in the registry of the Court of Appeal or the Court and may request the competent public offices for all useful information for the investigations to be carried out. For this purpose, however, the Panel also makes use of the inspection and oversight services of the State financial administration (art. 13, paragraph 3). The members of the Panel who are not magistrates are entitled, for each session they attend, to the payment of an attendance allowance the amount of which is defined by a decree adopted by the Minister of Justice, in agreement with the Minister of Economy and Finance (art. 13, paragraph 4).
With the aforementioned provisions, the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels were structured according to "a scheme that is certainly not new, which sees in electoral matters the establishment of administrative bodies attached to the ordinary judge", without this having resulted, as noted by this Court, "in the Panels themselves being integrated into the judicial apparatus, the lack of an organic nexus of institutional interpenetration which would allow them to be considered specialized sections of the judicial offices where they are established being evident, both functionally and structurally" (judgment no. 387 of 1996). Nevertheless, this Court recognized that, through the described modes of composition and functioning, the Panels are "established in such a way as to ensure a certain independence and are called to objectively apply a legal rule": Law no. 515 of 1993, precisely because of the "choice not to attribute the corresponding assessment and sanctioning activity to ordinary or administrative jurisdiction", intended to "accentuate the characteristics of third-partyness in the procedural phase of control" in the delicate matter of election campaign expenditures (still, judgment no. 387 of 1996).
As this Court has therefore already excluded that the bodies in question belong to the judicial apparatus, it must likewise be excluded that they, as administrative authorities, are incorporated, according to the relationship of dependence referenced by art. 27, paragraph 2, of the Supplementary Rules, within the Ministry of Justice. Rather, precisely because of the nature of the activity performed, they constitute an autonomous authority endowed with the characteristic of independence from the executive, which makes use of professional skills not belonging to ministerial offices (magistrates, chartered accountants, and university professors), whose appointment is entrusted to the President of the Panel itself and not to the Minister or any other ministerial official. The functions performed by the Panel, moreover, are not proper to the Ministry of Justice, and to different conclusions, the mere factual circumstance that, for the performance of these functions, the body uses the personnel serving in the registry of the Court of Appeal or the Court cannot obviously lead. Nor, finally, is the fact that Law no. 515 of 1993 has entrusted the definition of attendance allowances to the competence of the Minister of Justice, limited to non-magistrate members, relevant, this being a merely external aspect with respect to the functions performed by the body, such as not to constitute the characteristics of the required relationship of dependence with respect to the ministerial administration.
The conflict brought by the Region against the Minister of Justice, irregularly summoned in the present proceeding as lacking passive standing, must therefore be declared inadmissible (judgment no. 198 of 2017).
3.2.– The same cannot be said for the President of the Council of Ministers, who – based on the state nature of the oversight body, which will be discussed further below – was summoned in this proceeding in a manner consistent with the prescription of art. 27, paragraph 1, of the Supplementary Rules, that is, in his capacity as the representative body of the State, the latter being understood, naturally, according to what has been affirmed by the jurisprudence of this Court, "not as a legal person, but as a complex and articulated legal system (judgment no. 72 of 2005), consisting of bodies, with or without legal personality, and public entities distinct from the State in the strict sense, but placed in a relationship of instrumentality with it in view of the exercise, in different forms, of typical state functions" (ex plurimis, judgments no. 259 of 2019 and no. 31 of 2006).
The exception of lack of passive standing, raised by the State Attorney's defense, is therefore not well-founded limited to the summoning to judgment of the President of the Council of Ministers.
4.– What has just been observed regarding the non-existence of a relationship of dependence of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel with respect to the Ministry of Justice does not, however, exhaust the analysis regarding its legal nature, an analysis that – in light of the exceptions raised by the respondent parties – assumes a decisive weight on the admissibility of the present conflict.
Both the State Attorney's Office and the counsel for the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel have objected to the inadmissibility of the appeal due to the lack of subjective alterity between the appellant (Autonomous Region of Sardinia) and the body that issued the act (precisely, the aforementioned Panel), arguing that the latter would not fall within the State legal system but, rather, within that of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia itself.
4.1.– The exception is not well-founded.
It must, in fact, be reiterated that the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels were established by a State law (art. 13 of Law no. 515 of 1993), which conferred upon them administrative, oversight, and sanctioning powers regarding the electoral expenditures of candidates for the political elections of the two Chambers of Parliament (art. 14). The organization of these Panels on a "regional" basis depends on the original provision, by the same Law no. 515 of 1993, of a central guarantees Panel, composed of the First President of the Court of Cassation, or his delegate chosen from among the section presidents of the Court of Cassation, and six members appointed by the same First President according to the criteria of the aforementioned art. 13. The central Panel was responsible for deciding on appeals against the decisions of the Regional Panels, as provided by art. 14, paragraph 5, of Law no. 515 of 1993. The latter provision was subsequently repealed by art. 1 of Law no. 672 of December 31, 1996 (Provisions regarding the documentation of electoral expenditures), with the consequence that, as of now, the oversight activity on electoral expenditures is entrusted only to the Regional Panels, established in the capital of each region.
Moreover, Law no. 515 of 1993 had not extended the activity of the Guarantees Panels to regional elections. In fact, its art. 20, in identifying which provisions of the same law were applicable also to the "elections of the councils of regions with ordinary statutes and, where compatible, of regions with special statutes and of the autonomous provinces of Trento and Bolzano" (paragraph 1), had not included arts. 13 and 14. The system in force for regions with ordinary statutes was subsequently outlined by Law no. 43 of February 23, 1995 (New rules for the election of the councils of regions with ordinary statutes), whose art. 5, paragraph 4, letters e) and f), expressly established the application of arts. 13 and 14 of Law no. 515 of 1993 also to the elections of regional councils.
The Autonomous Region of Sardinia, being endowed with special autonomy, intervened to exercise its competence in electoral matters – as provided for by art. 16 of its special statute, in the wording in force at the time following the substitution introduced by the sole article of Constitutional Law no. 1 of May 9, 1986 (Amendment to article 16 of the special statute for Sardinia, approved with Constitutional Law no. 3 of February 26, 1948, concerning the definition of the number of regional councilors) – and, as early as art. 4 of Regional Law no. 1 of 1994, established to entrust the functions in matters of electoral expenditures, relating to the election of regional councilors, to the same oversight body established by State Law no. 515 of 1993, by referencing its arts. 13 and 14. Therefore, it was neither the establishment of a new regional body nor the delegation of a state body for the exercise of regional functions (as argued by the respondent parties in this proceeding), but simply the choice to allow, in its territory, the application of state law regulating the publicity and oversight of regional election campaign expenditures. This choice – as will be seen later – was then confirmed, in the current regional system characterized by the concurrent election, by universal and direct suffrage, of the Regional Council and the President of the Region, by the provision of art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013.
In other words, the Sardinian regional legislator operated a mere reference to the Panel established at the state level to operate in the territory of Sardinia, without establishing a specific and different regional administrative body.
The state nature of the body, moreover, finds indirect confirmation in the discipline relating to its organization and functioning, which provides – as already seen – for the establishment of the Panels at the offices of the ordinary judge and their composition through the involvement of some professional skills (magistrates) whose employment relationship is peacefully rooted in the State administration.
No less decisive, in establishing the state nature of the body in question, is the function performed, which expresses a unitary requirement of the legal order, that of superintending the correct conduct of election campaigns in order to ensure the transparency and legitimacy of voting operations. It must be reiterated that Law no. 515 of 1993 structured the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels in such a way as to ensure their necessary independence in the activity of overseeing expenditures, according to "a verification procedure that is activated ex officio, is carried out through a mere check of the prerequisites and conditions required by law in view of the possible issuance of a final measure lacking [...] finality" (judgment no. 387 of 1996). The oversight activity entrusted to the Panels, as functional to the correct and objective application of norms also relating to the eligibility of candidates, impacts the exercise of the fundamental right to passive suffrage, protected by art. 51 of the Constitution, which, as this Court has repeatedly emphasized, can only support those limitations that allow maintaining "a delicate point of balance with the right to active suffrage and the interests attributable to the genuineness of the electoral competition and the general democratic nature of institutions", limitations which, as such, rather than being subject to variously articulated regulations in the territory of different regions, necessarily "require a regulation inspired by unitary principles" (judgment no. 64 of 2025, point 6.5. of the Facts Considered).
It follows that, limited to regions with ordinary statutes as well as those with special statutes which (as has happened so far for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia/appellant), in the exercise of their statutory powers, have chosen not to establish specific regional bodies (unlike what was established by the Autonomous Region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia with art. 79 of Regional Law no. 28 of 2007), the administrative activities concerning the publicity and oversight of electoral expenditures, with reference to regional consultations, are carried out by the Panels provided for by arts. 13 and 14 of Law no. 515 of 1993, which have a state nature.
4.2.– The Autonomous Region of Sardinia has therefore correctly summoned the State and, for it, the President of the Council of Ministers in this proceeding for conflict, concerning the legitimacy of an act issued by an authority that – as illustrated above and even in the exercise of functions concerning the conduct of regional elections – is not incorporated into the administrative organization of the Region itself but is, rather, attributable to the broad notion of the State, as developed by the jurisprudence of this Court for proceedings under art. 39 of Law no. 87 of 1953.
5.– Still preliminarily, the exceptions of inadmissibility of the appeal due to lack of current injury and constitutional tone must be examined.
The exceptions were raised, in the constitution in judgment, by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel and were subsequently detailed in the subsequent supplementary memoranda. In particular, the respondent party notes that the proceeding to which this Court is called would concern "powers not yet exercised" (as they belong exclusively to the Regional Council) and, as such, would turn into "a sort of 'preventive consultation' [...] in order to release the current regional councilors from their institutional responsibilities and from judicial review": this would confirm the absence of any current injury to regional prerogatives.
5.1.– These exceptions cannot be upheld either.
It is certainly true, as recalled by the respondent Panel, that conflicts of attribution between the State and regions, to be admissible, must be characterized by a constitutional tone: it is necessary, that is, as constantly affirmed by this Court, that "the appellant alleges an injury to its constitutional powers (ex plurimis, judgments no. 90 of 2022, no. 22 of 2020 and no. 28 of 2018), as a result of a significant act or conduct, possessing external effectiveness and relevance and aimed at clearly and unequivocally expressing the claim to exercise a given competence (order no. 175 of 2020), in such a way as to determine the impairment of the appellant's sphere of constitutional attribution (judgment no. 259 of 2019)" (judgment no. 173 of 2023).
In the present conflict, however, these coordinates are respected. The appellant Region, in fact, does not merely contest the manner in which the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel performed its administrative activity, but questions, at the root, the very existence of the power exercised, with reference to the body's claim to impose the forfeiture of the President of the Region and to bind the Regional Council to the consequent determination. At the same time, the Region asserts that the illegitimate measure of the state oversight body has invaded, impairing, its constitutional prerogatives relating, primarily, to the correct and ordinary functioning of its elected bodies. It is argued, in fact, that the injunctive order would have illegitimately ordered the Regional Council to declare the forfeiture of the President of the Region, with the consequent activation, pursuant to art. 35, third paragraph, of the autonomy statute, of the automatic dissolution mechanism of the representative body itself.
5.2.– There is no doubt, however, that, with the alleged grounds of illegitimacy, the appellant alleged a direct injury to its constitutional powers, which occurred due to the exercise of a power that is assumed not to have been provided for by law or, even if abstractly provided for, that is assumed to have been exercised beyond the scope permitted by law. In fact, with the second ground of appeal, it is complained that the charges brought by the state oversight body are not subsumable under any of the factual situations for which art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993 provides the sanction of forfeiture: this, on the assumption that these factual situations are only found in paragraphs 8 and 9 of the same art. 15, and not also in the provision (indicated in the measure) of paragraph 7, as being too generic and indeterminate. Even more fundamentally, with the third ground of appeal, the lack of a legal basis for the challenged measure is complained of, arguing that the state Panel could not use, for the regional elections of Sardinia, the parameter constituted by Law no. 515 of 1993, which is to be considered inapplicable due to the changed regional form of government.
5.3.– For the foregoing reasons, it must be held that there exists not only the interest to appeal of the Region, "qualified by the aim of restoring the integrity of the sphere of constitutional powers" which are alleged to be impaired (judgments no. 259 of 2019 and no. 265 of 2003), but also the immediacy of the injury, resulting from the challenged act. The adoption of the latter, in fact, is contested as an illegitimate exercise of the power to sanction, with the measure of forfeiture, the President of the Region: which would in itself have already caused prejudice to regional autonomy, illegitimately stripped of its President and, at the same time, due to the rule " simul stabunt, simul cadent", also of its council body. Moreover, the terms used in the reasoning of the measure ("forfeiture from office of the elected candidate is imposed [...]") make the meaning to be attributed to the final part of the operative section evident, where the transmission of the injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council in view of the "adoption" of the forfeiture measure is prescribed. This prescription acquires, precisely in light of the motivational tenor, the tones of a true binding order, addressed to the Regional Council, to order the forfeiture effect.
The alleged injury of competence derives, therefore, immediately and directly, from the challenged act (among many others, judgment no. 137 of 2014), due to the clear manifestation of intent, found therein, to assert its own competence in imposing forfeiture and to relegate regional competence to mere executive activity.
Finally, it must be specified that, for the purposes of the admissibility of the appeal, the circumstance that the injunctive order issued by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel was challenged before the Court of Cagliari (the judge competent to rule on the interested party's opposition appeal, with the procedure under art. 6 of Legislative Decree no. 150 of 2011) is irrelevant. In fact, it must be recalled that "[t]he pendency of a proceeding before the judicial authority concerning the same act challenged in a conflict of attribution between public entities does not lead – as this Court has specified – to the inadmissibility of the conflict, where the constitutional tone exists (recently, judgment no. 57 of 2019)" (judgment no. 259 of 2019, point 5.1. of the Facts Considered). For the same reasons, the subsequent jurisdictional events, concerning whether or not the first-instance judgment has become final, are also irrelevant (events that were recalled, to support the inadmissibility of the appeal, by the defense of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel). It is not for this Court, even less so, to ascertain in this proceeding the eventual occurrence of substantive res judicata on the aforementioned judgment, as irregularly requested, in this proceeding, by the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel (most recently, with the memorandum filed on September 3, 2025).
6.– On the merits, the appeal is well-founded to the extent set out below.
6.1.– It is necessary to start, as a logically preliminary issue, from the regulations applicable to the Autonomous Region of Sardinia in matters of publicity and oversight of election expenditures relating to regional consultations.
On this point, the appellant Region – through the third ground of challenge – maintained that the challenged injunctive order would have incurred an erroneous interpretative assumption, as it considered Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 applicable. The latter, in fact, lays down the discipline only for the elections of regional councilors and not also for that of the President of the Region (which constituted a non-elected body at the time). In the appellant's view, the non-applicability of Regional Law of Sardinia no. 1 of 1994 would also be confirmed by the express provision of art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, which, for the discipline of ineligibility and incompatibility, refers to "State laws": this would thus exclude not only (and directly) the regional law of 1994 but also (indirectly) Law no. 515 of 1993 itself. As the latter, being a state law, would have been referenced by the Sardinian legislator for the discipline of ineligibility and incompatibility, the actual scope of application would still derive from its own provisions which, in art. 20, exclude that, for regional elections, arts. 7 and 15, dedicated, respectively, to the substantive discipline on election expenditures and the consequent sanctioning regime, are applicable. Consequently, the challenged injunctive order, which applied precisely these two provisions, would still prove to be without legal basis.
6.2.– The appellant's reasoning is only partially acceptable, as it must be stated, for the reasons that follow, that the normative parameter to which to refer, to establish whether and within what limits Law no. 515 of 1993 is also applicable to the regional elections of Sardinia, is exclusively art. 22 of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013.
6.2.1.– Pursuant to art. 15, second paragraph, of the autonomy statute, as added by Constitutional Law no. 2 of 2001, a regional law of Sardinia, approved by the Regional Council with an absolute majority of its members, is required, in harmony with the Constitution and the principles of the legal order of the Republic, to determine the form of government of the Region and, specifically, as relevant herein, the cases of ineligibility and incompatibility of the President of the Region.
The requirement of necessary harmony with the Constitution guides the regional discipline towards the provisions dictated by art. 122, first paragraph, of the Constitution – as substituted by art. 2, paragraph 1, of Constitutional Law no. 1 of November 22, 1999 (Provisions concerning the direct election of the President of the Regional Executive and the statutory autonomy of the Regions) – according to which the cases of ineligibility and incompatibility of the President and other members of the Regional Executive, as well as regional councilors, "are regulated by regional law within the limits of the fundamental principles established by law of the Republic".
The Law of the Republic has subsequently intervened and established the fundamental principles. These are those expressed in art. 2 of Law no. 165 of 2004, among which, as far as is most relevant herein, is that of letter d), formulated as follows: "attribution to the Regional Councils of the competence to decide on the causes of ineligibility of their members and of the President of the Executive elected by universal and direct suffrage, without prejudice to the competence of the judicial authority to decide on the related appeals. The exercise of the respective functions is guaranteed in any case until the final ruling on the said appeals".
6.2.2.– The fundamental principle just recalled binds the legislative competence of regions with ordinary statutes (judgment no. 64 of 2025) and, as an expression of a general principle of the legal order, is not without relevance for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, required, as already seen, to exercise its primary competence in the matter in question (therefore, also with regard to the discipline of cases of ineligibility and incompatibility of elected offices), "in harmony with the Constitution and the principles of the legal order of the Republic" (art. 15, second paragraph, of the special statute).
Moreover, as this Court has already affirmed, "the exercise of legislative power by the Regions in areas, although assigned to them in a primary capacity, concerning ineligibility and incompatibility for elected offices necessarily meets the limit of respect for the principle of equality specifically sanctioned in this matter by art. 51 of the Constitution" (judgment no. 143 of 2010).
At the same time, however, this Court has constantly recognized that differentiated legislative provisions may be admissible "only in the presence of 'particular environmental situations' (judgment no. 283 of 2010) or 'peculiar local conditions' (judgments no. 143 of 2010 and no. 276 of 1997), or 'entirely peculiar or exceptional local conditions' (judgment no. 539 of 1990), or, again, 'only for particular categories of subjects that are exclusive' to the special region, 'or present themselves differently, when compared with those of the same categories of subjects in the rest of the national territory' (judgment no. 288 of 2007; in identical terms, judgment no. 108 of 1969), or, again, 'only for particular categories of subjects that are exclusive to the Region' (judgment no. 189 of 1971)" (thus, most recently, judgment no. 60 of 2023).
Situations that, however, cannot be considered present in the instant case.
It must, in fact, be reiterated, subject to the aforementioned hypotheses, in a general sense, that "the regional legislation on access to elected offices must be strictly compliant with the principles of state legislation, due to the need for uniformity throughout the national territory" (judgment no. 288 of 2007), as the right to passive suffrage, protected by art. 51 of the Constitution, is considered a " 'fundamental political right, recognized to every citizen with the characteristics of inviolability (under art. 2 of the Constitution)' (judgments no. 25 of 2008, no. 288 of 2007 and no. 539 of 1990)" (still, judgment no. 143 of 2010) and which, as such, "can only be regulated by general laws, which can limit it only in order to realize other equally fundamental and general constitutional interests, without placing substantial discrimination between citizen and citizen, regardless of the region or place of belonging" (judgment no. 235 of 1988).
6.2.3.– In implementation of art. 15, second paragraph, of its autonomy statute, the Autonomous Region of Sardinia intervened to regulate the matter of ineligibility and incompatibility with the provisions set out in Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, which dedicated only art. 22 to it, containing a declaration of provisional discipline (and placed, in fact, among the "Transitional Provisions" of Chapter III). Paragraph 2 of this provision established the following: "In matters of ineligibility and incompatibility, until the approval of a regional discipline pursuant to article 15 of the Special Statute for Sardinia, in addition to what provided by the Statute itself, State laws apply".
This provision was subject to an authentic interpretation with regard to the regime of incompatibilities only. Art. 1 of the Regional Statutory Law of September 11, 2014, no. 1 (Ineligibility and incompatibility with the office of regional councilor: authentic interpretation of article 22, paragraph 2, of Regional Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013), specified that the expression "in addition to what provided by the Statute itself" is interpreted in the sense that for the categories provided for by art. 17 of the statute (which, in its second paragraph, already contemplated hypotheses of incompatibility for regional councilors) "any reference to state legislation is excluded and the cases of incompatibility are only those provided for by the same article 17".
As for the cases of ineligibility, in the absence of a similar clarifying intervention by the regional statutory legislator, it is up to the interpreter to correctly understand the meaning of the reference to "State laws". This, obviously, on the necessary assumption that this reference, due to its objective breadth, must include the reference, in addition to the State laws dedicated to the ineligibility of national elected officials (the two Chambers of Parliament), also to those that regulate the same matter with regard to the elected officials of regions with ordinary statutes. Under a first aspect, therefore, the reference under art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013 is to be understood as referencing the State laws that regulate, ex professo, the causes of ineligibility for the elections of the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate of the Republic, as well as for the elections of the regional councils of regions with ordinary statutes. The hypotheses contemplated in Presidential Decree no. 361 of March 30, 1957 (Approval of the consolidated text of laws establishing rules for the election of the Chamber of Deputies), as well as in Legislative Decree no. 533 of December 20, 1993 (Consolidated text of laws establishing rules for the election of the Senate of the Republic), and in Law no. 154 of April 23, 1981 (Rules on ineligibility and incompatibility for the offices of regional, provincial, municipal and constituency councilor and on incompatibility of employees of the national health service), therefore acquire relevance, also for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia.
The objective breadth that characterizes the reference, moreover, suggests that it – under another and more specific aspect – intends to reference all State laws that provide for special causes of ineligibility, additional to those identified by the general sources mentioned so far. These special hypotheses also include those which are the subject of Law no. 515 of 1993, which acquire relevance for the present proceeding, even regardless of the fact that these are cases of ineligibility, entailing forfeiture, which that law (in art. 20, paragraph 1) originally established only for the elected offices of the national Parliament. In fact, art. 5, paragraph 4, of Law no. 43 of 1995 extended those cases also to regions with ordinary statutes, establishing that "[t]o the elections of the councils of regions with ordinary statutes, the provisions of the following articles of Law no. 515 of December 10, 1993 apply", and subsequently indicating, also art. 7, paragraphs 3, 4 and 6 (letter a), and art. 15, paragraphs 7, 8 and 9 (letter g).
The fact that this extension is now also valid for the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, although endowed with statutory autonomy, is objectively derived from art. 22 of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013. In fact, paragraph 1 of art. 22 expressly references Law no. 43 of 1995 to regulate, on a transitional basis and where compatible, the administrative organization of the procedure and voting for the election of the President of the Region and the Regional Council. Consequently, for the election campaign for the elections of the President and the Regional Council, art. 5, paragraph 4, of Law no. 43 of 1995, which in turn references arts. 7 and 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, is also applicable, where compatible. To this must be added the provision of paragraph 2 of art. 22 of the Statutory Law in question, which confirms that, for the discipline of ineligibility, Law no. 43 of 1995 is valid, albeit on a transitional basis, and as a State source.
6.2.4.– It must then be concluded that the rules on election campaign expenditures dictated by arts. 7 and 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993 are also applicable to the election of the President of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, in a manner substantially analogous to what Regional Law no. 1 of 1994 had already provided under the old regional form of government.
6.2.5.– From this, a further confirmation is obtained of what was already stated above, namely that in the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, by choice attributable to the statutory regional legislator, the entire oversight apparatus established to ensure the correct application of the rules on publicity and oversight of electoral expenditures (apparatus that Law no. 515 of 1993 built, for national elections, around the establishment of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panels) is operational.
In this way, the Region, by referencing them, adopted the transparency requirements that underlie the discipline on the election campaign, as introduced by Law no. 515 of 1993. Far from creating a legislative vacuum for this Region concerning the publicity and oversight of expenditures of candidates in regional elections (a thesis, the latter, fallaciously supported in this proceeding by the same Region), it must be reaffirmed, on the contrary, that, precisely thanks to the reference made by art. 22, paragraph 2, of Statutory Law no. 1 of 2013, the instruments that Law no. 515 of 1993 provided to guarantee the genuineness and authenticity of the formation of the will of the electorate, along with the freedom of vote of the electors, are operational, also for Sardinian regional elections. Therefore, even the "financial mechanisms", "presided over by a series of checks and burdened by rigid procedural requirements" by that law, through which it is "possible to disseminate ideas and form consensus" (judgment no. 387 of 1996), must be considered an integral part of the electoral order currently in force in the Autonomous Region of Sardinia, including those under arts. 7 and 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993. The intent that this Court has already recognized in the state legislator of 1993, to "satisfy multiple needs, such as balancing the dissemination of electoral programs with the guarantee of effective equality between groups and candidates, adapting propaganda to the majoritarian logic of the new system, which implies the risk of personalizing political dialectics, and making contributions, expenditures, and asset and income situations relating to the elected officials transparent" (judgment no. 387 of 1996), can therefore be extended to the Sardinian statutory legislator of 2013.
6.3.– All the foregoing premised, the appeal is well-founded to the extent set out below.
This Court has constantly affirmed that with respect to the fundamental right to passive suffrage, "inelegibility constitutes the rule, while ineligibility represents an exception; therefore, the provisions governing the latter are to be interpreted strictly" (most recently, judgment no. 131 of 2025, referencing, among many others, judgment no. 120 of 2013; furthermore, also judgments no. 25 of 2008 and no. 306 of 2003). This requires a rigorous interpretation of art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, in the sense that the causes of ineligibility (and consequent forfeiture from the elected office) are only those delineated therein in a certain and explicit manner.
The well-foundedness of the appeal emerges precisely with regard to the modalities that, in the instant case, marked the action of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel; modalities inconsistent with the provisions of Law no. 515 of 1993, and not in line with the spirit of the same law.
The injunctive order considered it possible to find a hypothesis of forfeiture, imposing it as a constraint for the Regional Council, in the following factual situations – charged to the elected President – of violation of the provisions of Law no. 515 of 1993: failure to appoint an "electoral representative" responsible for collecting election campaign funds (art. 7, paragraph 3, of Law no. 515 of 1993); failure to open a single bank account, dedicated to all asset operations concerning the election campaign (art. 7, paragraph 4, of Law no. 515 of 1993); filing of a declaration on expenses incurred, with related financial statement, characterized by various non-conformities with the provisions of art. 7, paragraph 6, of Law no. 515 of 1993.
However, none of the, albeit serious, ascertained violations is specifically identified, by art. 15 of Law no. 515 of 1993, as a hypothesis of forfeiture. The explicit hypotheses of forfeiture are different and are found in paragraphs 8 and 9 of the aforementioned art. 15, which refer them to the failure to file the declaration on expenses within the prescribed term "despite a formal notice to comply" (paragraph 8) and to the "exceeding of the maximum permitted expenditure limits [...] by an amount equal to or greater than double" (paragraph 9). This follows from paragraph 7, which links ineligibility and the consequent forfeiture effect to the "cases expressly provided for in this article". This provision must be understood in accordance with the ratio of Law no. 515 of 1993, which is – as already seen – to strictly direct the power of ascertainment of the Guarantees Panel, when it comes to ineligibility, towards certain and predetermined factual situations, such as not to allow free assessments, regarding forfeiture, by the oversight body.
This provision defines the task of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel to arrive, "definitively", at the ascertainment of the facts preceding the declaration of forfeiture, to be submitted to the Regional Council. This, as the provision specifies, only in the hypotheses established by the same art. 15, which therefore coincide exclusively with those indicated as such, explicitly, by the subsequent paragraphs 8 and 9.
It could not be replied that, in the reasoning, the order of the Guarantees Panel, while referring to paragraph 7 of art. 15, and explicitly speaking of a non-conforming declaration on expenses, actually intended to contest the more serious factual situation consisting of the "failure to file the declaration within the prescribed term", which paragraph 8 elevates, as seen, to an explicit hypothesis of forfeiture. The unequivocal tenor of the reasoning of the act is an obstacle to this reconstructive hypothesis, in which the oversight body clarified (page 5 of the order) "that the failure to file the expenditure declaration and financial statement - as provided for by art. 15, paragraph 8, of the referenced law (formal notice and fifteen-day term, as specifically required by the provision)" was "not at all contested to Todde", but rather that "the anomaly resulting from the non-conformity of the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed by herself" was contested, given that the Panel had the possibility to examine "the expenditure declaration and financial statement filed with the related documentation".
Based on the foregoing, it must be concluded that it was not within the competence of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel to impose the forfeiture of the President of the Region, based on factual situations not attributable to those indicated in art. 15, paragraphs 8 and 9, of Law no. 515 of 1993, as such not even suitable for legitimizing the communication of the measure to the President of the Council of Ministers, pursuant to art. 15, paragraph 10, of Law no. 515 of 1993.
6.4.– The conclusions reached by this Court exhaust the judgment to which it is called in this capacity, as the act exceeded the powers granted to the state oversight body and caused an impairment of the powers constitutionally guaranteed to the Autonomous Region of Sardinia.
The question relating to the possibility of reclassifying the facts, which is reserved to the civil judge, competent for the opposition proceeding against the injunctive order, remains unaffected.
7.– Within the terms indicated, the appeal of the Autonomous Region of Sardinia is therefore to be granted and it must be declared that it was not within the competence of the State and, for it, of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, to affirm, in the reasoning of the injunctive order of December 20, 2024, that "the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate is imposed" and, consequently, to order "the transmission of this injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council for matters within his competence concerning the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia".
Consequently, the aforementioned injunctive order must be partially annulled.
for these reasons
THE CONSTITUTIONAL COURT
1) declares inadmissible the appeal for conflict of attribution between public entities indicated in the heading, brought by the Autonomous Region of Sardinia against the Minister of Justice;
2) declares that it was not within the competence of the State and, for it, of the Regional Electoral Guarantees Panel established at the Court of Appeal of Cagliari, to affirm, in the reasoning of the injunctive order of December 20, 2024, that "the forfeiture from office of the elected candidate is imposed" and, consequently, to order "the transmission of this injunctive order to the President of the Regional Council for matters within his competence concerning the adoption of the measure of forfeiture of Todde Alessandra from the office of President of the Region of Sardinia";
3) consequently, partially annuls the aforementioned injunctive order.
Decided in Rome, at the seat of the Constitutional Court, Palazzo della Consulta, on September 24, 2025.
Signed:
Giovanni AMOROSO, President
Maria Rosaria SAN GIORGIO, Rapporteur
Valeria EMMA, Registrar
Filed in the Registry on October 15, 2025