Articles by: Judith Harris

  • Facts & Stories

    After the Barcaccia, What Is To Be done?

    ROME – The day after it was damaged by drunken Dutch soccer hooligans Feb. 19 I paid a visit to the Bernini fountain called La Barcaccia – the big boat. Already the entire fountain was, like the surrounding Piazza di Spagna itself,  spotlessly clean.

    As a silent, meditative crowd stood behind the new barriers surrounding the fountain,  restorers took photographs documenting the 110 signs of damage blamed upon the Dutch Feyenoord fans. In Rome for an Europa League match against AS Roma, some of them urinated into wine bottles which they then threw at police. 

    To hear of this, and, worse still, to see the damage is certainly shocking, and cost estimates for at least an attempt at restoration begin at $3.3 million. A series of visibly deep chips mar the rim of the boat, which is sculpted of travertine. On the positive side, not everyone agrees that the damage is “irreparable and permanent,” as Giovanna Marinelli, head of culture for city hall, has declared.

    The often cantankerous (and brilliant) art historian Vittorio Sgarbi maintains that the fountain can surely be repaired. For Sgarbi, some of the damage to the travertine may well be due to its recent restoration, completed only last year. “The damage is virtually nonexistent,” he said in an interview with the daily Il Messaggero. The previous cleaning of the travertine had made it particularly fragile, Sgarbi went on to say. “The real damage, for me, is the lack of respect – turning the fountain into a garbage dump.” 

    Sgarbi had no sooner spoken than Florentines were complaining about the rash of graffiti writers sullying their city. From Florence Aldo Luigi wrote that, “We were all so scandalized at the Dutch who made Rome filthy, but at least they don’t do that in their own homes, while we put up with the Italian cretins who vandalize their own and our house. At least the Dutch who were arrested will have to pay Euro 45,000, but when ours get stopped by the police all they get is a lecture and then let go home.” (For a video of Florentine graffiti, see <<< ).

    Rome itself is hardly immune: the walls of the entire area surrounding Campo de’ Fiori and Trastevere are disgustingly filled with graffiti, as are even new commuter trains, both inside and out, to the point that it can be hard to see out a window. So far it has been useless to point out that, if all are removed immediately, the writers tend to stop, as has been shown in other cities. In addition, some here still praise the writers as artists. Some may be, but not in the great historic cities of Italy. (To see Roman graffiti, check out <<<).

    What is to be done to avoid such problems in the future? Already in Rome there are fears of a potential clash next Saturday, when Northern League leader Matteo Salvini will hold a political rally at Piazza del Popolo. Anti-Salvini posters are scattered around town, with an invitation for a march against his version of the Northern League expanding into the Center and South. Police here will try to keep the two demonstrations at a distance, but that will not be easy. Gleeful tourists regularly jump into other beloved historical fountains, like the Trevi Fountain, newly restored for the second time in twenty years. Worse still – far worse, obviously – are the threats from the Jihadist militants that they will come to Rome. 

    For the moment, no one quite knows how best to protect the fragile Italian cities like Venice as well as Rome and Florence from hooligans, tourists, graffiti and the Italians themselves. One suggestion is to put more monuments behind iron fencing, as was done in the turbulent Eighties and Nineties, when political clashes were frequent. In this way the Column of Marcus Aurelius and the Arch of Constantine in Rome were protected from vandalism. 

    Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums, rules out this solution. When he was superintendent of culture (museums, sites) in Florence, a fence was proposed to protect the 14th century Loggia dei Lanzi, which had become a haven for homeless, who slept there and had damaged it. He vetoed this in favor of  “continuous police vigilance, the best way albeit very costly.” 

    Marinelli agrees, urging better police work and an increase in surveillance cameras. Perhaps most sensibly she also points out that Romans are so accustomed to being surrounded by beauty and historic sites that they become immune to them. “We are considering activating teaching in the schools so that future generations who will be the custodians of our cultural heritage will appreciate it more,” she says.

    In the meantime a Dutch woman living in Rome, Elisabeth Jane Bertrand, has launched an appeal for funds to help with the Barcaccia restoration, and in two days collected, via her website Scusa Roma Actie, Euro 4,000.
  • Facts & Stories

    After the Barcaccia, what is to be done?

    ROME – The day after it was damaged by drunken Dutch soccer hooligans Feb. 19 I paid a visit to the Bernini fountain called La Barcaccia – the big boat. Already the entire fountain was, like the surrounding Piazza di Spagna itself,  spotlessly clean.

    As a silent, meditative crowd stood behind the new barriers surrounding the fountain,  restorers took photographs documenting the 110 signs of damage blamed upon the Dutch Feyenoord fans. In Rome for an Europa League match against AS Roma, some of them urinated into wine bottles which they then threw at police. 

    To hear of this, and, worse still, to see the damage is certainly shocking, and cost estimates for at least an attempt at restoration begin at $3.3 million. A series of visibly deep chips mar the rim of the boat, which is sculpted of travertine. On the positive side, not everyone agrees that the damage is “irreparable and permanent,” as Giovanna Marinelli, head of culture for city hall, has declared.

    The often cantankerous (and brilliant) art historian Vittorio Sgarbi maintains that the fountain can surely be repaired. For Sgarbi, some of the damage to the travertine may well be due to its recent restoration, completed only last year. “The damage is virtually nonexistent,” he said in an interview with the daily Il Messaggero. The previous cleaning of the travertine had made it particularly fragile, Sgarbi went on to say. “The real damage, for me, is the lack of respect – turning the fountain into a garbage dump.” 

    Sgarbi had no sooner spoken than Florentines were complaining about the rash of graffiti writers sullying their city. From Florence Aldo Luigi wrote that, “We were all so scandalized at the Dutch who made Rome filthy, but at least they don’t do that in their own homes, while we put up with the Italian cretins who vandalize their own and our house. At least the Dutch who were arrested will have to pay Euro 45,000, but when ours get stopped by the police all they get is a lecture and then let go home.” (For a video of Florentine graffiti, see <<< ).

    Rome itself is hardly immune: the walls of the entire area surrounding Campo de’ Fiori and Trastevere are disgustingly filled with graffiti, as are even new commuter trains, both inside and out, to the point that it can be hard to see out a window. So far it has been useless to point out that, if all are removed immediately, the writers tend to stop, as has been shown in other cities. In addition, some here still praise the writers as artists. Some may be, but not in the great historic cities of Italy. (To see Roman graffiti, check out <<<).

    What is to be done to avoid such problems in the future? Already in Rome there are fears of a potential clash next Saturday, when Northern League leader Matteo Salvini will hold a political rally at Piazza del Popolo. Anti-Salvini posters are scattered around town, with an invitation for a march against his version of the Northern League expanding into the Center and South. Police here will try to keep the two demonstrations at a distance, but that will not be easy. Gleeful tourists regularly jump into other beloved historical fountains, like the Trevi Fountain, newly restored for the second time in twenty years. Worse still – far worse, obviously – are the threats from the Jihadist militants that they will come to Rome. 

    For the moment, no one quite knows how best to protect the fragile Italian cities like Venice as well as Rome and Florence from hooligans, tourists, graffiti and the Italians themselves. One suggestion is to put more monuments behind iron fencing, as was done in the turbulent Eighties and Nineties, when political clashes were frequent. In this way the Column of Marcus Aurelius and the Arch of Constantine in Rome were protected from vandalism. 

    Antonio Paolucci, director of the Vatican Museums, rules out this solution. When he was superintendent of culture (museums, sites) in Florence, a fence was proposed to protect the 14th century Loggia dei Lanzi, which had become a haven for homeless, who slept there and had damaged it. He vetoed this in favor of  “continuous police vigilance, the best way albeit very costly.” 

    Marinelli agrees, urging better police work and an increase in surveillance cameras. Perhaps most sensibly she also points out that Romans are so accustomed to being surrounded by beauty and historic sites that they become immune to them. “We are considering activating teaching in the schools so that future generations who will be the custodians of our cultural heritage will appreciate it more,” she says.

    In the meantime a Dutch woman living in Rome, Elisabeth Jane Bertrand, has launched an appeal for funds to help with the Barcaccia restoration, and in two days collected, via her website Scusa roma Actie,  Euro 4,000.
  • Op-Eds

    Terror Hides Among the Migrants?

    ROME – It was supposedly an Egyptian diplomat in London who “revealed” that extremist Muslim terrorists are expected to be hiding among the thousands of migrants herded out of Libya and toward Italy on rickety boats.

    The London Daily Telegraph reported Feb. 17 that, “The jihadists hope to flood Libya with Isil militiamen who will then pose as migrants on people trafficking vessels heading to Europe.”

    Although this may eventually be true, to date all jihadist attacks in Europe have been perpetrated by those living in Europe, not by newcomers. So far there is no trace of terrorists hiding among the migrants: “We take their fingerprints, we check each one,” said a police spokesman in Sicily.
     

    Even without this new risk, the hordes of migrants fleeing war in Syria, Iraq and Sub-Saharan Africa to land on Italian shores (most of whom go elsewhere in Europe) present Italy with an ever more intractable political problem, as well as for their care-and-feeding.

    The numbers are terrifying: in 2014 Italy was the first European port of call for 170,000 migrants, more than double the 156,000 who had arrived during the previous two years.

    Last week, as the situation in Libya worsened, 2,164 migrants arrived on sixteen rickety boats in just 36 hours, and 300 more died when their boat sank. Exactly 3,538 had arrived in January, despite waves “high as a three—story building,” said the captain of an Italian rescue boat. The sea was so rough that he feared for his own crew as they helped the terrified migrants.
     

    In a nasty new twist, “scafisti” (illegal captains) armed with Kalashnikovs fired gunshots at the Italian Coast Guard ship trying to rescue migrants 50 miles off the Libyan coast. Investigators here say that Jihadists are already making money from the migrants, who are now paying up to $3,000 for passage toward Europe via Libya. One of the arrivals had a gunshot wound in his leg because, frightened at the conditions, he tried to avoid leaving but was shot and thrown aboard the rubber boat.

    The fear that jihadists will hide among the desperate migrants is already unleashing political problems in Italy. Matteo Salvini, 51, head of Lega Nord since December 2013, asked this week: “Are they really peace lovers, these immigrants arriving in Italy? Up to me, I’d take care of them, give them food and a drink, help them. But I’d keep them way out at sea and not let them land here. We already have enough [of them].” 

    Anti-migrant talk like this finds listeners all over Europe, and Salvini’s party has leaped from its origins as a strictly Northern event to winning a hearty following in the South. Polls show that his party continues to make steady gains, moving up in just one week from 15.2 to 15.5%, according to La Sette TV. This puts Salvini three points above Silvio Berlusconi’s troubled Forza Italia; indeed some believe that the aggressive Salvini may well take over as the leader of the Italian right, to rival Premier Matteo Renzi.
     

    Salvini has an eccentric curriculum. An activist in the young rightist “Padani” movement promoting independence for the Po Valley region, he ran as a candidate on the Communist Padani list in 1997. He has been a member of the European Parliament and a Milan city councilman.

    In just two years he has re-anchored the Lega Nord as an Italian rather than strictly Northern, separatist party, as it was under the now retired Umberto Bossi. Salvini knows how to capture headlines, as when he posed semi-nude on the cover of the magazine Oggi just before Christmas. 

    This week the headlines were about his refusal to pay the customary courtesy call, which his own party had requested, upon the new president of Italy, Sergio Mattarella. “Che ci vado a fare?” (Whatever would I do there?), he asked.

    “What do I have to ask him – his barber’s phone number?” The insolence angered Alessia Morani, deputy head of the Partito Democratico (PD) group in the Chamber of Deputies, who called Salvini’s words “unacceptable, contradictory and manipulative,” and showing, “once again, little sensitivity to state institutions.” From the President came a note of surprise at his no-show, to which Salvini responded that, “When it’s useful, I’ll go.” Rather pointedly, Beppe Grillo, head of Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S), does plan to call upon President Mattarella. 

    Salvini calls NATO leaders “cretins” for sending 5,000 men to the Ukraine. Instead of sending troops to the Russian border, NATO should have sent them to fight IS. Salvini himself paid a recent courtesy call upon Russia’s Vladimir Putin, one of whose goals is to discredit NATO.

    Salvini and his ilk like Putin, who has gone out of his way to cultivate parties on Europe’s far right and on its far left as well. In the UK Nigel Farage, head of Britain’s far-right, anti-European Union UKIP, has called Putin one of the world leaders he most admires. Marine Le Pen in France is another: according to NPR, a Russian bank has loaned her Front National party $11 million. 
     

    Salvini has also visited North Korea, which he described on his return as a “gigantic opportunity for our businessmen – they [North Korea] need many things.” There was a link with his Russian visit: “The embargo against North Korea is idiotic and should be lifted, as should that imposed upon Putin’s Russia.” The sanctions upon Russia were imposed because of Russian involvement in the war in the Ukraine.
  • Life & People

    Family-style San Remo Song Festival Triumphs

    It is safe to predict that the 65th season of the San Remo Song Festival ends in triumph Saturday night. After a dull season last year, the quintessentially Italian musical competition returned in grand form with 11 million tuning in nightly. Among the reasons for this lively revival was emcee Carlo Conti’s return to the family-style festival of the distant past, when performers like Nilla Pizzi, Domenico Modugno, Claudio Villa, Peppino Di Capri and Massimo Ranieri had all of Italy glued to their black and white TV sets.

    In case anyone missed the point, on the inaugural festival evening Tuesday the bespectacled, family-style Conti brought on stage what he called Italy’s largest family. As it turned out, larger families do exist in Italy, but anyway Aurelio Anania, 47, his wife Rita, 43, and their 16 youngsters from Catanzaro made an impressive showing in the midst of the San Remo pop hoopla and eyebrow-raising styles. Aurelio spoke movingly of the grace of God responsible for the joy of having such a big and “extraordinarily normal” family, living in a small apartment (110 Sq. M) with a modest stipend. Theirs is “a family of other times, built upon solid principles of sacrifice and everyone’s commitment,” intoned one commentator.

    Offsetting some of this in the festival was the presence of the popular bearded Austrian trans entertainer Conchita Wurst, born Thomas Neuwirth, singing “Heroes.” Austria’s “bearded lady” (as the UK daily Telegraph called her) had won the Eurovision competition in 2014. At San Remo one of the two hostesses handed her a huge bouquet of flowers, saying, “To you because you are a flower,” to the same generous applause accorded the 18 Ananias. (To see Conchita perform go to: >>>)

    I’ve always loved the San Remo festival ever since I saw my first in Rome back in 1966, and one of the joys of the annual event is being able to listen to the radio playing, all day long, and sing along with the grand old songs of the past, like Gigliola Cinquetti’s “Non ho l’eta’” (I’m too young) of 1964 and Modugno’s “Nel blu dipinto di blue” (In the painted blue of blue – actually, untranslatable!) of 1958, better known as “Volare.” Not to mention ”Nessuno mi puo' giudicare” (No one can judge me) sung by Caterina Caselli and “Una lacrima sul viso” by Bobby Solo. And can anyone forget “Lontano dagli occhi” (Far from my eyes) by the wonderful Sergio Endrigo?

    Full disclosure: for RAI International I even broadcast the festival from San Remo for two years running. Together with my co-host Augusto Milano, who handled the festival in Italian (I was the English-language presenter), we were tucked into a RAI van just at the edge of the catwalk, and conducted interviews.

    On one extraordinary evening we were joined by none other than Nilla Pizzi, who had won the festival edition of 1952 singing “Vola Colomba.” (You can hear her in 1952 at  >>>  and again in 1972 at >>> ) She was still singing, and beautifully, in our van, her voice soaring right over the young singers in the competition (among them a 15-year-old I was obliged to interview). It was a special moment when an Italian woman working in India phoned us to say that she would never had guessed that hearing our broadcast of San Remo would make her incredibly nostalgic for Italy. And in fact overseas listeners are still out there, and tracked, from Canada to New Zealand.

    So if family style, or at least nostalgia for it, is reviving the Festival at an age when human beings go into retirement, what about the real Italian family? According to the official statistics-gathering agency ISTAT in its 2014 annual report on Italy, “Changes in the structure of families…reduce the informal exchange of help,” meaning that it is tougher on the young to help the ever older relatives because people live longer (almost to age 80 for Italian men, over 84 for women). This, combined with the low birth rate of 1.42 children per female in 2012, makes such “informal exchange of help” difficult.

    So does the economic crisis. In the Mezzogiorno or South of Italy almost 8% of families live in absolute poverty; in all of Italy, almost 5%. In an incredible increase, almost 48,000 Italian families – more than triple the number of a decade ago – now live in shanties, trailers or tents, again according to ISTAT.

    The divorce rate is on the rise: in 1995 there were 158 separations and 80 divorces for every 1,000 marriages, but now well more than double that. Marriages that fall apart usually last fifteen years, when couples tend to separate, and divorce after 18. The median age of those divorcing is 47 for men and 44 for women, and the figure is high because couples tend to marry later in life than ever in the past. “Religious marriages are the most stable,” but in general recent marriages do not last very long. Maybe not – but San Remo does.
  • Facts & Stories

    Italy’s New President: Judge Sergio Mattarella


    ROME – It so is over, and quickly. The twelfth president of the Italian Republic is Sergio Mattarella, 74, constitutional court judge and former cabinet minister. The victory of this former Christian Democrat (DC), who won by 665 votes after only four ballots, brings to a felicitous end a political battle which had presented grave risks. Of 1,008 possible electors (deputies, senators, lifetime senators, regional representatives), 995 took part, beginning at 9:30 am. Mattarella’s election in an atmosphere of solemnity was confirmed at 1:30 pm with a standing ovation. The first telegram of congratulations arrived within minutes from Pope Francis.
     
    The election, which required a simple majority of 550, strengthens the position of Matteo Renzi as both the head of government and head of his Partito Democratico (PD). At the same time it marks a signal setback for the right-wing Forza Italia (FI) headed by former Premier Silvio Berlusconi and a rap on the knuckles for Beppe Grillo’s wild-card Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S), whose  candidate, Ferdinando Imposimato, was runner-up with 127 votes.
     
    Renzi’s coup was made possible by his making peace with his normally antagonistic PD left wing of party hacks, young Turks, trade unionists and old-guard former Communists. Renzi’s leftwing of PD rebels had been infuriated by the so-called Nazareno Pact pact deal their leader had made with Berlusconi a year ago over major reforms. The PD vote for Mattarella was specifically against Berlusconi’s express wishes, which left that Pact in the gutter, at least for now. For the same reason Mattarella attracted other votes from the left, such as from Nichi Vendola’s Sinistra Ecologia Liberta’ (SEL). For Vendola, Mattarella “is a transparent (limpido) figure both morally and politically.”
     
    As a former DC, Mattarella also attracted votes from such conservative parties as Scelta Civica. These center-right votes were deemed essential, given the risk that within the PD some might, in the secret ballot, ignore party orders. And in the end Renzi’s governing partner Angelino Alfano and the Nuovo Centro Destra (NCD) agreed to vote for Mattarella.
     
    Not least, the 20-some politicians who have either quit or been kicked out of Beppe Grillo’s Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S) also rallied around Renzi’s candidate. In short, in one fell swoop Renzi’s choice of candidate outfoxed both Grillo and Berlusconi. Although with what future results for governing and the major pending reforms remains to be seen, today’s election further postpones risk of early national general elections.
     
    Inside the Forza Italia camp there was fury (“chaos,” according to La Repubblica daily)  at what was called Renzi’s betrayal. Looking ahead, Silvio Berlusconi had cannily ordered his followers “out of respect for the office” to vote blank ballots rather than for the FI preferred contender, former Premier (and former Socialist) Giuliano Amato. In the event, results show that many in FI did not follow his lead. “One more autogol” (own goal), sentenced the head of a Berlusconi rebel faction, Raffaele Fitto.
     
    It will not be easy for Berlusconi to rebuild his image; in case anyone had forgotten it, due to his sentence for tax fraud, Berlusconi had to race from Rome and its politicking Thursday after the first day’s voting to return to Milan for his obligatory weekly community service in a home for the elderly.
     
    Mattarella is a widower and lives extremely modestly in Rome, making regular weekend trips to his native Palermo to visit his children and grandchildren, and also to be coiffed by his favorite barber. Sobriety is his stock in trade; and in a tribute to Mattarella’s soft-spoken and courteous manner and decorous lifestyle, one headline put it this way: “Grey is the new black.” This was in its way Heckled loudly in a street one day, Mattarella turned to the man abusing him and said quietly, “Why shout? We can discuss this together.” The heckler, taken aback, immediately turned quiet, and the two began a calm discussion.
     
    Four generations of the Mattarella family have been in politics, and the family has been called the Kennedies of Sicily. His father, Bernardo, was a Christian Democratic politician in the get-rich-quick years of Palermo. His brother Piersanti became head of the Sicilian Region and was murdered at age 40 by the Mafia; only after this did Sergio himself pick up the reins and enter politics, on the left wing of the DC. The political tradition continued when Piersanti’s son, named Bernardo for his grandfather, became a deputy in the regional government.
     
    When the election process began three days ago, fears were of a repetition of the stalemate in 2013, when the then newly elected Parliament –the same as today’s – was splintered into three, and the presidential election turned into an endless and inconclusive round of voting, resolved only by the re-election of President Giorgio Napolitano.
  • Fatti e Storie

    Erri De Luca, No TAV e la libertà di parola

    “Questo processo riguarda la libertà di parola”, il pluripremiato scrittore Erri De Luca lo dichiara a i-Italy in una intervista telefonica. “Sono incriminato per ciò che ho detto in pubblico”. De Luca, 65, parla alla conclusione della prima udienza al tribunale di Torino, dove è sotto processo per aver detto che il sabotaggio ai lavori sulla linea dell'alta velocità tra Francia e Italia, è legittimo.

    Il tunnel, conosciuto con il nome di TAV, portato avanti dalla compagnia francese Lyon Turin Ferroviaire (LTV) e da un'altra compagnia italiana, sembra sia stato costruito con l’amianto (e se così fosse sarebbe inquinante). La costruzione è stata più volte ostacolata da dimostrazioni spesso degenerate in maniera violenta.

    La denuncia contro l'autore è stata portata avanti dalla compagnia francese LTV e sono molti gli intellettuali italiani che si oppongono.

    De Luca è un autore molto noto di oltre 50 libri – Il Peso della Farfalla da solo ha venduto mezzo milione di copie in Italia ed è stato tradotto in 20 lingue, dal coreano al persiano.

    Ma a causa delle sue parole, durante un'intervista con l'Huffington Post nel settembre 2013, rischia da tre a cinque anni di prigione per presunto “incitamento al crimine”.

    De Luca aveva risposto su Facebook, dicendo, “Vogliono usare il tribunale per censurare la libertà di parola”. Allo stesso tempo, ieri in un'intervista italiana ha detto che il paragone tra “il mio piccolo stravagante evento giudizioario” e l'assassinio di Charlie Hebdo è inappropriato.

    Appena un giorno prima di questi fatti, un'altro tribunale, riunito in un'aula bunker di massima sicurezza nel carcere di Torino, ha condannato 47 dimostranti No TAV per un totale di 150 anni di carcere per aver provocato atti di violenza estrema nell'estate del 2011. Sono solo 6 gli assolti.

    Conosciuti come “No Tav” per la loro opposizione alla costruzione del tunnel, il 3 luglio di quell'anno in Val di Susa, si sono scontrati con la polizia lanciando pietre per due giorni, con un risultato di 180 feriti.

    Secondo l'avvocato della difesa Claudio Novaro, le forze di polizia provocarono gli incidenti lanciando “una quantità enorme di fumogeni” contro i migliaia di dimostranti. Inoltre ha definito “una caricatura”, la relazione fatta dal Ministero della DIGOs.

    Ancora, dopo la sentenza di ieri, alcuni simpatizzanti No TAV hanno scagliato delle pietre contro la polizia e bloccato l'autostrada.

    All'udienza preliminare in relazione al caso De Luca, il giudice ha respinto almeno uno degli argomenti dell'accusa, la quale aveva provato a collegare le parole dell'autore con la validità del collegamento ferroviario stesso.

    “Stranamente” ha detto De Luca “non è lo Stato italiano che mi ha chiamato in causa – ma la compagnia francese, accusandomi di averle arrecato danno. Il pubblico ministero ha accettato anche se si potrebbe pensare che è lo Stato ad essere la parte maggiormente interessata.”. De Luca verrà interrogato alla prossima udienza, che si terrà il 16 Marzo.

    Allora la parola stessa “sabotaggio” è mancante di significato vista la sua ambiguità. “la parola ha molti significati – perfino Gandhi l'ha usata. A parte il danno materiale c'è anche un'implicazione di “ostruzione” anche in un Parlamento. Anche uno sciopero di lavoratori può essere considerato una forma di “sabotaggio”, cosi come le dimostrazioni per I diritti civili”.

    Da scrittore De Luca si sente responsabile di parlare a nome di quelli che, citando la Bibbia, nelle parole di Re Lemuele “apri la tua bocca [per parlare] al posto del muto”, non possono parlare per se stessi. Per il suo avvocato Gianluca Vitale, “le parole di un intellettuale non possono costituire un crimine. Il giudice ha sostenuto che un dibattito a riguardo fosse utile, ma continuiamo ad essere convinti che questo è un processo contro la libertà di parola, e dimostreremo senza problemi che non è stata commessa nessuna istigazione al crimine.

    Il senatore Stefano Esposito, 46, del Partito Democratico è il vice presidente della Commissione ai Trasporti al Senato. Per Esposito la linea dell'alta velocità è importante, questa posizione gli è costata intimidazioni e persino minacce di morte.

    “Penso che il tribunale di Torino ha finalmente dimostrato che gli atti di violenza dell'estate 2011 sono realmente avvenuti, anche se questo fu negato per anni da intellettuali e dal circolo mediatico che ha protetto la parte violenta del movimento No TAV, a cominciare da Erri De Luca, il quale ha parlato di “processo politico” cosí da distogliere l'attenzione [dagli atti di violenza] e farne una questione ideologica. Questa è delinquenza [teppismo].”

    De Luca ha un lungo trascorso di attivismo radicale, come ha dichiarato al nostro reporter uno dei suoi amici attivisti di sinistra degli anni 60, quando era diffuso un alto grado di anarchismo. Secondo questo dichiarato anarchico, “era dovuto alla scia degli eventi di quel periodo”.
     

     Ma è veramente necessario questo processo? Si chiede  Cesare Martinetti de La Stampa. Visto che “nessuno può negare che la libertà di opinione esista ancora in Italia, lasciamo che gli intellettuali, inclusi i vecchi amici sinistroidi di De Luca, si siedano intorno ad un tavolo e parlino davanti ad un piatto di polenta.”

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  • Facts & Stories

    Erri De Luca and the No TAV: “This Trial is About Words”


    ROME –“This trial is about words and, yes, freedom of speech,” prize-winning author Erri De Luca told www.i-italy.org in a telephone interview. “I am incriminated because of phrases I had said in public.” De Luca, 65, was speaking at the conclusion of the first hearing today before a court in Turin, where he is on trial for saying that to “sabotage” work on a 35-mile tunnel for a high-speed train link between France and Italy is legitimate.
     
    The tunnel known as the TAV, under construction by the French company Lyon Turin Ferroviaire (LTV) and another in Italy, is being cut through a reportedly asbestos-ridden (and if so, potentially polluting) mountain in Piedmont, and has been vigorously opposed in demonstrations  that have ended in violence. The case against him was brought by the LTV and is opposed by many Italian intellectuals.
     
    De Luca is the popular author of over 50 books – his Il Peso della Farfalla alone sold a half million copies in Italy and has been translated into 20 languages, from Korean to Persian. For his words in the course of an interview with the Huffington Post in September 2013 he risks from three to five years in prison for alleged “incitement to commit crimes.” To this De Luca responded on Facebook, saying, “They want to use the court to censure free speech.” However, he was also careful to say in an Italian interview today that any free-speech comparison between “my whacky little judiciary event” with the Charlie Hebdo murders in France was inappropriate.
     
    Only the day before this another court, convened in a bunker-like hall at a maximum security prison in Turin, sentenced 47 anti-tunnel demonstrators to a total of 150 years in prison on charges of provoking extreme violence during the summer of 2011, and acquitted six. Known as the “No TAVs” for their opposition to the tunnel, the rock-throwing demonstrators had battled with police for two days, with 180 injured on July 3 that year in the Valle di Susa. According to defense attorney Claudio Novaro, police forces had provoked the incidents by hurling “a floodtide of tear gas” at the thousand-strong demonstrators, and called the report prepared by the Interior Ministry DIGOs “a caricature.” However, after yesterday’s verdict was announced, No TAV sympathizers threw rocks at police and blocked a highway.
     
    At today’s preliminary hearing on the related De Luca case, the presiding judge rejected at least one of the arguments of the prosecutors, who had tried to link the author’s words with the validity of the No TAV. “Oddly,” De Luca told this reporter today, “it is not the Italian state that is prosecuting me – it is the French company, accusing me of being damaging to them. The prosecutor accepted this even though one would think that the state would be the more interested party.” At the next hearing, which will take place only March 16, De Luca will be questioned.
     
    At that time the word “sabotage” itself is likely to be challenged since its meaning can be ambiguous. “It means many things – even Gandhi used it. Besides material damage the implication is also ‘obstruction’, even in a Parliament. A transport workers’ strike, too, can be a form of sabotage, and demonstrations for civil rights.”
     
    As a writer De Luca considers that he has a responsibility to speak out, for, he said, quoting the Bible verse words of King Lemuel, “Open your mouth [to speak] for the mute” –that is, speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. For his lawyer in Turin, Gianluca Vitale, “The words of an intellectual cannot constitute a crime. The judge held that a debate on the question was useful, but we continue to be convinced that this is a process against free speech, and we will calmly show this this is not an instigation for a crime.”
     
    Senator Stefano Esposito, 46, of the Partito Democratico is Vice President of the Transport Commission of the Senate. For Esposito, the projected train line is important, a position which has brought him intimidations and even death threats. “I do think that the Turin court has finally shown that the violence of the summer of 2011 existed, even though this was denied for years by the intellectuals and media circus that protected the violent part of the movement against the high-speed train, beginning with Erri De Luca, who spoke of a ‘political trial’ so as to shift attention away [from the violence] and make it all about ideology. This is delinquency [teppismo].”
     
    De Luca has a long background of fairly radical activism, as was vouchsafed to this reporter by one of his fellow leftists from the Sixties, when a certain degree of anarchism was widespread. Said this admitted anarchist, who spent months in prison for political violence, “That was in the winds – we all felt that way.” But is his trial really necessary? asked Cesare Martinetti in La Stampa Jan. 8. Since “nobody can deny that freedom of speech exists in Italy,” just let the intellectuals, including from the far leftists who are De Luca’s old buddies, sit around and talk their heads off over a plate of polenta.
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    Berlusconi: Back Again Through The Back Door


    ROME – Assailed by a hailstorm of legal troubles, one-time Premier and Senator Silvio Berlusconi, 79, was kicked out of the front door of the Senate thirteen months ago. This week Berlusconi returned, albeit through the back door, thanks to his year-old political agreement – some are now calling it an embrace – with Premier Matteo Renzi known as the Nazareno Pact.
     
    A vote in the Senate Jan. 21 was called to eliminate 35,800 amendments to the ambitious reform bill known as the “Italicum,” whose aim is to make Italy’s election system more efficient. That sounds good, but, because the bill hands considerable power over the choice of candidates to the party bosses, leaving rank-and-file party members little choice, a hefty faction within Renzi’s own PD has fought against the Italicum as it is currently written. The tsunami of hostile amendments was, in fact, theirs. However, the importance of the actual passage of a reformed election law, in the works now for eight years, cannot be understated. Among the other conditions in the Renzi bill:
    -- To have parliamentary representation a party must obtain 3% of the vote.
    -- In order to avoid small parties from blocking votes, the party winning more than 40% will obtain automatically obtain 340 seats in the 630-seat Parliament
    -- The powers of the Senate will be severely reduced so that the decisions in the Chamber of Deputies will not be rejected, creating an endless back-and-forth stalemate
     
    Leading the PD opposition to Renzi on this is Professor Miguel Gotor, an historian and neophyte politician who is the de facto stand-in for Renzi’s real adversary within the party, hardliner Pier Luigi Bersani, PD secretary from 2009 until Renzi succeeded him in 2013. When the vote on dropping the amendments was called, the Gotor-Bersani group of 27 senators voted against their own party, complaining that Renzi would not even negotiate with them – “He only talks with Berlusconi.” The result: despite their defections, Renzi won – but only thanks to 46 votes from Berlusconi’s Forza Italia.
     
    Renzi defends the Nazareno Pact as an informal coalition limited solely to specific reforms in the larger interest of the nation. Berlusconi views the Renzi version of the Italicum as a way to encourage the center-right parties (which include Alfano’s Alleanza Nazionale) to merge. Needless to say, complaints poured in from all sides. “The Nazareno pact is now transformed into the Nazareno party,” in the words of one discomfited PD senator.

     
    Nor was everyone in the Berlusconi camp pleased, and at least ten Forza Italia defectors refused to follow Berlusconi’s orders to vote with Renzi. They had a point: in theory Berlusconi is a leader of the opposition to Renzi’s coalition government, whose partner is a Berlusconi breakaway, Angelino Alfano. Said Raffaele Fitto, leader of the Forza Italia dissidents fighting the Berlusconi line, “It was an incredible error on Berlusconi’s part. He is killing Forza Italia.|
     
    Just a year ago Berlusconi and Renzi held a long private meeting at Largo del Nazareno, near the church of Sant’Andrea delle Fratte in Rome, in a building that now houses the national offices of Renzi’s Partito Democratico (PD). Overlooking the two during the meeting were photos dating from the pre-PD political past of the Italian Communist party, including a shot of Fidel Castro playing golf with Che Guevara.
     
    At the time of that meeting Italian politics were at a standstill, thanks to a seemingly unbreakable three-way political split pitting Berlusconi, whose party is again called Forza Italia, on the right, against the center-leftish PD under Renzi and Beppe Grillo’s wild card Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S). The aim of the accord hammered at that time between Renzi and Berlusconi was to work together basically against Grillo.
     
    The final vote on the Italicum takes place next week, and Gotor promises that the PD dissidents will continue their opposition despite appeals for them to support Renzi’s version of the Italicum. Renzi himself supposedly said in private that, “They [the defectors] are making Berlusconi a central figure again.” Many others here are critical of the minority faction’s obstinacy, on grounds that the dissidents should either leave and create their own party, or back Renzi so that he has no need to negotiate with Berlusconi, in whatever political swap may lie in the background.
     
    The same Berlusconi-Renzi informal coalition is expected to play a key role in Italy’s next urgent vote, which begins in just one week: election of a president to replace Giorgio Napolitano.
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    Quirinal Palace horse trading begins

     ROME –Former President Giorgio Napolitano left office definitively Jan. 14, to return to his home in Rome’s colorful, ancient Monti quarter, a stone’s throw from Trajan’s Forum. His departure after nine turbulent years in office was moving to watch as, in the great courtyard of the Quirinal Palace, he received the formal farewell salute of a horseback brigade in full regalia.

    Now, with that ritual behind, the less elegant horse trading to elect a successor begins in earnest. Two years ago Napolitano agreed to succeed himself only to break a long political stalemate. The question is whether that stalemate will be repeated, without a Giorgio Napolitano to smooth over a difficult transition.

    Premier Matteo Renzi predicts speed. He has announced that the election process is to begin Jan. 29 and, he adds hopefully, will be concluded by the first days of February. He actually said: “It is reasonable to think at the end of this month we will have a new president of the Republic.” This is less than likely:  the first ballot is to take place Jan. 30. In the election process a total of 1,009 voters are to participate: 630 deputies, 315 senators, 58 regional delegates, and six lifetime senators. For the first three ballots a two-thirds majority is required, and that appears unlikely, but after that just 505 votes are necessary.

    On paper this should be a shoo-in. Because the so-called “Nazareno Pact” between Renzi and former Premier Silvio Berlusconi eleven months ago has not been entirely blown out of the water, the two groups alone account for 580 votes – 450 from Renzi’s Partito Democratico (PD) and around 130 from Berlusconi’s Forza Italia (FI). In fact, the numbers are far fewer.

    For one thing, the presidents of the Chamber and the Senate, both PD, do not vote by tradition. Most importantly, it is no secret that the majority PD has a massive, grumbling inner opposition, and at least 40 of Berlusconi’s theoretical 130 minions are considered breakaways. In short, because this is a secret ballot, neither of the two large parties which have agreed to merge their votes can be certain of how many votes they can actually command. In Italian parlance, those disobeying party calls for unity are known as “franchi tiratori”, or sharpshooters.

    Besides sharpshooters, there are other unknown unknowns which further muddy the equation. The  Renzi and Berlusconi parties are not alone is having their MPs and senators steal away openly or otherwise; Beppe Grillo’s Movimento Cinque Stelle (M5S) is reduced in size because Grillo and bad-hair PR sidekick Gianroberto Casaleggio have so far expelled 26 of their numbers. Of these, twenty are reportedly willing to negotiate with Renzi over the choice of a presidential candidate. If this may be a plus, there is another group with which Renzi, who is coordinating election politics, must deal. His governing partner Angelino Alfano, who had broken with Berlusconi to create a party called Alleanza Nazionale (AN), has just made common cause with the former Christian Democratic leader Pier Ferdinando Casini. Together these two seem to have a voting package of 70 – but their rightist votes will further alienate Renzi’s noisesome leftists.

    You may be able to do the addition, but even if you are good at math, bear in mind that personal as well as political grudges come to bear, and inside that secret ballot box – made of plaited straw, it is called the “salad bowl” – no one knows what will be the outcome.

    When Napolitano was re-elected two years ago, he made a gruff acceptance speech in which he said he had agreed to succeed himself – an historical first for Italy – because he was counting upon governments which would bring about serious reforms. Has the premier he appointed been able to deliver those promised reforms, which range from reducing Senate powers (and the Senate itself) so as to speed up the voting process, to writing new election rules? Most observers here say that these important reforms have not been passed despite Renzi’s energetic efforts and genuine commitment. The most important is the pending election reform bill, called the Italicum. This bill and election of a successor to Napolitano are tightly interwoven, even though pundits now suggest out that it may already be too late for new early elections to be called in the Spring.

    Passing of the Italicum, which was part of the Nazareno Pact, was hindered in commission by the Northern League’s presenting no less than 16,000 amendments. The minority within Renzi’s own PD also asked for modifications, which were in part accepted. Two quarrels arose. One was over the minimum percentage of votes which a party must obtain in order to be represented in Parliament. The other was whether the party bosses are to choose candidates or whether voters may make their own choices, and this is not yet resolved. At the moment, according to PD Senator Miguel Gotor, “Projections show that 60% of new candidates for parliament will be blocked [i.e., chosen by the party leadership] and only 40% by the people. This distresses me,” he went on to say. “We must get this right – I don’t want to be here five years from now complaining about the election law. We must give Italy the best one possible.”

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    French Terror Spills Over Onto Italy



    ROME – As if inevitably the political fallout from the hideous murders and ongoing terror stalemate in France is as great or greater than anywhere else in Europe, save for France itself. Security measures have been tightened throughout Italy, but such concerns are in the forefront, beginning with the safety of Pope Francis and of the faithful who flock into St. Peter’s Square daily in Rome. The risk goes beyond the Vatican, an obvious target, because the Italian Parliament recently voted to supply weapons to Kurdish fighters at war with the IS in the territory between Syria and Irak.
     
    Even as the Roman press associations, including the Foreign Press Association to which I belong, held a candle-light vigil Thursday night at Piazza Farnese in sympathy with the French victims, Interior Minister Angelino Alfano was drawing up a list of urgent security measures which he called upon Parliament to enact. Among these is imprisonment from three to six years for anyone leaving Italy to enlist in a jihadist war, and withdrawal of the passport and severe prison sentences for terrorist suspects. Other measures he requested (but why are they not already enacted?) include the prohibition of the sale of ingredients for making explosive devices, and the monitoring of on-line sites that advocate “hared and violence,” with their eventual blackout. Alfano acknowledged that “in Italy there are present 53 ‘foreign fighters.’”
     
    The political repercussions are already beginning to surface. Whereas Pope Francis appealed Thursday for dialogue with moderate Islam, the feisty young leader of the Northern League, Matteo Salvini, speaking on Radio Padania, attacked the papal position on grounds that, “This is already a real war. To try to deal with this with nicey-nicey tolerance is suicide.”
     
    Left-leaning Italian columnist Curzio Maltese, writing in Il Venerdi Jan. 9, points out that Salvini has managed to convert the League from its thirty years of history as a local movement primarily interested in promoting independence for the Italian North into a nationwide movement that has akin to and with affinities with Marina Le Pen’s in France. “It’s impressive that Matteo Salvini has managed to rubbish” the old-style League narrative,” said Maltese. For months Salvini has battled against uncontrolled immigration, a potent political weapon even before today. One recent poll showed that 14% of Southern Italians are, at least in theory, ready to vote for him.
     
    Fears here are that the French horrors will generate rightist, anti-immigrant votes, a fact that Premier Matteo Renzi cannot ignore. Even as Renzi is obliged to negotiate with hostile political forces for the election, presumably in February, of a new president, the very parties with which he must deal are jumping onto the anti-immigrant train despite the fact that most of the migrants entering Italy do not remain here, and are themselves refugees from war.
     
    From former Premier Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia comes an appeal to “defend our values – kind-hearted multiculturalism has not brought good results in Europe.” The president of the Italian Bishops Conference, Angelo Bagnasco, has appealed to the moderate Muslims in Italy “to take their distance in a clear=cut way from these events.” Otherwise, he warns, there is the risk of a “violent” reaction.
     
    Salvini’s strident stepping onto center-stage has effectively sidelined Beppe Grillo, who, to stake out a position, found nothing better than to insinuate that behind the French terrorists may be an unseen puppet master, as per the assassination of John Kennedy, the 1965 Milan bank bombing and the murder of Osama B in Ladin. “Other truths [may be] kept hidden,” he sentenced.
     
    To deal with all this – with the needed security measures, with the political fallout at a time of political tensions – will require cool, clear thinking on the part of the best political minds in Italy.

      

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