The creation of Sannio Acque S.r.l., the new mixed-ownership company for water services in the Sannio district, has opened a public dispute over whether one person can serve at the same time as mayor and as chair of the company.

The exchange opposes Pompilio Forgione, mayor of Solopaca and president of the board of Sannio Acque, and the Comitato ABC. Forgione defends the dual role as unpaid and institutional. The committee calls it incompatible and says it has referred the matter to the Prefettura di Benevento, asking Forgione to resign from one of the two posts.

No judicial or administrative decision definitively settling the incompatibility question was available in the validated research. What follows summarizes both positions as reported, and the wider company context.

What the dispute is about

The controversy concerns the compatibility between Forgione's office as mayor of Solopaca and his office as president of the board of directors of Sannio Acque S.r.l.

The Comitato ABC argues that Article 63 of the TUEL, the consolidated law on local authorities, does not distinguish between unpaid and paid offices for this purpose. In its reading, the overlap between the role of mayor and the role of president of Sannio Acque creates a conflict of interest even if the company post carries no salary.

Forgione rejects that reading. He says his post in Sannio Acque is unpaid, institutional and without operational or management powers, and points to the public-control mechanisms provided in the statute.

The committee describes Forgione's reply as a "toppa peggio del buco" — a fix worse than the hole — and maintains that incompatibility is, in its words, a matter of law.

Forgione's defense: unpaid role and municipal control

Forgione says the presidency is free of charge and limited to institutional and coordination functions, with no management authority over contracts, operations or day-to-day administration.

He refers to Article 22 of the company statute and to a control mechanism under which board decisions require representative approval linked to two-thirds of the population of the member municipalities. In his account, control is therefore guaranteed precisely by the representatives of the municipalities, rather than concentrated in the chair.

The full text of the statute was not directly verified in the research, nor was the complete text of Article 63 of the TUEL through the Normattiva page consulted. The regional decree No. 71 of 23 September 2026, mentioned in Forgione's statement, was also not directly acquired.

The committee's reply: gratuity does not remove the conflict

The Comitato ABC contests Forgione's reconstruction. It argues that gratuity does not remove the conflict of interest foreseen, on its reading, by Article 63 of the TUEL.

The committee says it has reported the issue to the Prefettura di Benevento. A referral to the Prefettura does not itself decide the legal question; it asks the territorial representative of the central government to examine it. The committee is asking for Forgione to step down from one of the two offices.

The committee also raises a broader concern about representation at the start of the company. It states that only 3 of 78 municipalities initially joined, with a combined population of about 6,000 inhabitants, below the 161,180 inhabitants indicated in the financial plan. Those figures are the committee's statements and still require verification against official company or financial documents.

The committee further refers to doubts attributed to the Corte dei Conti of Campania about the sustainability of the operation. The full text of the negative opinion attributed to the Court was not acquired; the account so far comes from the committee.

Wider context: a public-majority company seeking a private minority partner

Sannio Acque is structured as a mixed company with a public majority. The Campania Region has published open procedure No. 4035/AP/2025 to select a minority operating private partner and to assign connected tasks for management of the integrated water service in the Ambito Distrettuale Sannita.

That structure matters for readers because the legal debate is not only about one person. A mixed public-private water company combines municipal ownership and control with an operating partner selected by tender. Questions about who chairs the board, who approves board decisions, and how municipalities exercise joint control affect how public oversight works in practice.

A second useful context is the population threshold cited by both sides. Forgione points to a two-thirds-of-population approval mechanism as a safeguard. The committee points to low initial adhesion — 3 municipalities and about 6,000 inhabitants on its figures — to question whether that safeguard and the financial plan rest on a sufficiently broad base. The research does not resolve which population count is currently represented or forecast, and those numbers should be checked in official corporate acts.

What is not yet established

Several points remain open:

  • There is no acquired court or administrative ruling finally establishing Forgione's incompatibility.
  • The complete statute of Sannio Acque and the complete applicable text of Article 63 of the TUEL were not directly verified.
  • The figures on adhering municipalities, population and the financial plan are committee statements requiring confirmation in official documents.
  • The full opinion attributed to the Corte dei Conti and the cited regional decree were not directly acquired.

What to watch next

The next verifiable steps would be any response from the Prefettura di Benevento, publication of the full statute and board rules, updated lists of member municipalities and represented population, and official documents on the tender for the private minority partner.

For residents, the practical issue is straightforward: who governs the new water company, how municipalities control its decisions, and whether the leadership arrangement survives legal scrutiny.