“Minniti Doctrine a Suicide, the Victory of the Yes in the Citizenship Referendum Can Reverse the Course”, Miraglia Speaks

Filippo Miraglia, head of immigration at Arci national: The second highest office in the state, the president of the Senate Ignazio La Russa, proclaims his intention to campaign for non-voting in the referendums of June 8 and 9. What kind of democracy is this? The Italian right, or perhaps it would be better to say the extreme right, has demonstrated in these two and a half years of government and majority in Parliament that it has no sense of the State and no respect for the Institutions. There are many cases that could be cited starting from the events that have seen Ministers and Undersecretaries as protagonists. The President of the Senate is not a stranger to statements that highlight a certain contempt for institutional roles. The second highest office of the State could enter into the merits, he has the right, of the referendum vote and express his opinion. But inviting people not to vote is truly intolerable for someone who holds such an important role. Perhaps La Russa forgets, when it suits him, that voting is one of the foundations of democracies and that it is always important to invite citizens to go to the polls when they are called to do so. But it is clear that in the Italian right, the interest of the party prevails over the general one, they have been demonstrating it every day since they arrived in the rooms of the Government.

Citizenship, work, social rights. Big issues, those posed by the 5 referendum questions , on which Arci has spent a lot in recent years. For us this event is very important and we are trying to activate our entire network to reach the difficult but possible goal of a quorum. Already collecting signatures for the citizenship referendum, for which we have been committed since the very beginning, seemed like a difficult goal. And yet, it was achieved with great enthusiasm and in just a few days. Here the bar is higher, but we are convinced that there is a majority of our society that wants to participate, if it is called on for concrete and unambiguous objectives. The rights of workers and the rights of foreigners are concrete and central issues for the quality of our democracy. They clearly define what kind of society we want. On the one hand, with the vote in the referendum and the Yes there is an inclusive and open society, where equality between people and their dignity are the central point of reference. On the other hand there is a closed society, which excludes and discriminates and where profit counts more than people, than their very lives. Unlike elections, where there is often ambiguity and people do not participate because they do not feel represented, with referendums the reason for going to vote is clearer and more direct. For this reason we have great confidence in reaching the goal of the quorum, even if we know that the last days are decisive and that we must work to activate each of our members and managers.

Citizenship means inclusion, welcome, a multiethnic and multicultural vision of a national community. Isn't a yes in the referendum also a big NO to the securitarianism and demonization of the other, migrant, refugee, foreigner, on which the right continues to hammer? Citizenship is not a topic that can be immediately superimposed on immigration. Citizenship is granted to people who have been here for many years and who have chosen Italy as the country in which to live and raise their children. Those who can apply for citizenship also meet the conditions for being a long-term resident, and almost always already have a residence permit for this purpose. Very stringent conditions must be met that imply job, economic and social stability. The campaign to criminalise immigration has, however, also had consequences on the issue of citizenship, which has also been overwhelmed by the avalanche of hatred and resentment produced by the xenophobic right, in the absence of adequate responses from democratic and left-wing forces. The failure of the reform that saw the center-left withdraw at the last step of the legislative change that only concerned minors in the Senate, after approval by the Chamber in 2017, was unfortunately the demonstration that while the xenophobic right uses immigration to orient the electorate, build hegemony, the forces of the center-left, with some exceptions fortunately, are afraid of the voters. And fear leads to taking positions that, when things go well, are within a framework defined by the right. In many cases chasing their positions. Always according to 2017, the "Minniti doctrine" was the most explicit in this sense: accepting the representation constructed by the right, it put in place effective responses on their ground. A political and cultural suicide, as demonstrated by the results of the 2018 elections and the success of the Lega's rancor machine. Reaching the quorum and saying yes to the referendum today would concretely represent a U-turn and could perhaps push the opposition forces, which in the meantime it must be said have changed their attitude, but have not completely archived the Minniti era, to more explicitly choose the terrain of rights as a terrain for gaining consensus and not as a topic to be afraid of and to keep away from.

These are times of precariousness, of poverty from work and not only unemployment. A huge unresolved social question. The data that have been recently published by Istat tell us that a growing part of our young people, and not only the young, choose to go abroad to seek better working and social conditions. Among these young people in recent years, the percentage of those of foreign origin has grown, who, despite being born and/or raised in our country, do not see a dignified and solid future for themselves and their families in Italy . Precariousness, low wages and poor work , as well as the progressive withdrawal of the State from essential services, starting with healthcare and school, is making our country less and less welcoming for everyone, Italians and foreigners. The decline is around the corner, if it has not already begun, and the responsibility lies with a ruling class, not only political, without vision and too often focused on its own interest and the present. The demographic balance tells us that, if we do not make important decisions, if we do not invest in our common future, childcare services, schools, universities and training, this country of ours is destined to decline from many points of view.

Freedom is participation, sang the great Giorgio Gaber. Has the left understood this? I am not convinced. Perhaps when Gaber said it, the leaders of the left were clear about the relevance of that idea and the role of politics in promoting participation and protagonism of social subjects. Today, there is a great distance between the parties and society. We, who are a social promotion organization, a third sector body, a cultural and popular association, struggle to have a stable and healthy dialogue with the parties. In recent years, they have been too focused on internal dynamics and the fate of individual leaders to notice what was happening around them. Something seems to be changing lately. Elly Schlein's leadership in the Democratic Party seems to be able to bring about a change . The coalition that has already presented itself in several electoral appointments, regardless of the results, could take the right path. We see a different interest in what is happening in society on the part of many parliamentarians. But we are still not at the turning point that would be needed. Too many uncertainties and still too many calculations based on internal logic and on the interest of individual leaders. We also need a commitment to promote participation and protagonism of people and communities in public space. And that is what we are committed to in this difficult season.

Can one be left-wing, or more simply democratic, human, without being indignant and protesting about the immense ethnic cleansing taking place in Gaza ? The genocide of the Palestinians in Gaza and the occupied territories is unbearable. It leaves no room for ambiguous interpretations, which unfortunately are very present in much of politics and the mass media. This government, like the European Union, is clearly complicit in the extermination that is taking place before the eyes of the international community. An international community that for decades has pretended not to see what was happening to the Palestinians. The wall, apartheid, targeted killings. The expropriation of homes and lands. Israel is not a democratic country, as so many blindfolded commentators tell us every day. Millions of people lived, even before October 7, in a large cage, without any freedom and without hope. Humiliated and dispossessed of their future every day. How can a regime that does this to millions of people be called democracy? If the international community, our government, the EU, continue to use ridiculous, embarrassing words, in the face of the massacre of defenseless civilians that is taking place every day in Gaza, in the face of genocide, ethnic cleansing, the risk we run is that the law of the strongest will be asserted, as the American president and all his friends seem to want to say, without any limit and without any space for international mediation. What is happening in Gaza concerns us very closely and the Italian parliamentarians who have left for Egypt in these hours have done well to try to bring international solidarity to the Palestinian victims at the Rafah crossing . With them are also some Italian organizations including Arci with our president Walter Massa. We hope that it will serve to change at least in part the way in which governments are dealing with this tragedy. A collective effort will be needed to keep attention high and broaden the protest as much as possible.

FROM

Umberto DeGiovanniangeli