Last stage of post-election tour in search of reasons for the defeat of the left. In the Sicilian town, including petrochemical, water privatization and volunteerism. Where the Rainbow is too "trade union" and the Democratic Party in the hands of former chiefs Dc "Old" industrialism and the "new" environmentalism
Astrit Dakla Syracuse.
For half a century here, but be blind and both devoid of smell, you can not get to Syracuse from the north without disturbing apocalyptic perception of its industrial dimension. The railway and main roads - those that connect the former more important political and cultural center of Magna Graecia and then the Mediterranean with Palermo Catania, Messina and the rest of Italy - all go inside or beside the "petrochemical", the largest in Europe, the view for miles and miles of the refinery towers, storage tanks, the cracker , the very high "candles" flaming, accompanied by the heavy smell of hydrocarbons, fumes, dripping in tangles of pipes, makes it clear to everyone what Syracuse has lost, in the twenty-five centuries elapsed between the rule of the tyrant Dionysius I and to Stefania Prestigiacomo, Last "goddess" of the city - even if not responsible for its evils. Air, water and land, respiratory diseases, birth defects and mortality all over the media have been the result of the dramatic choice to align along one of the most beautiful beaches of the Mediterranean Sincat the Rasiom, Enichem, the Espeso, ICAM, the Isab, Sasol, the Erg and the more so on and so forth, until the last and largest of all, Russia's Lukoil, landed in Syracuse this spring by buying half of the Erg and laying the foundations for further expansion in volumes fine. But, on the other hand, this choice has also created thousands of jobs in a poor, increased income, engendered a culture of industrial workers, trade union and political (not to forget the 'facts of Avola, "few km from Syracuse, with two uccisi e 48 feriti durante una manifestazione sindacale nel '68, e poi la lotta contro gli euromissili nella vicina Comiso) che in Sicilia quasi non esisteva - e che ora sta tornando a non esistere anche a Siracusa.«La maggior parte dei dirigenti della sinistra qui si sono formati con quella cultura, legata alla presenza del petrolchimico - racconta Ermanno Adorno, 50 anni di politica cittadina fra Psi, Psiup, Dp, Rifondazione, oppure in solitudine - e sono rimasti via via sempre più incapaci di capire che il mondo intorno a loro cambiava. A Siracusa la sinistra politica è sempre stata una sorta di emanazione del sindacato, che ha prodotto quadri e amministratori: ma oggi quel tipo di cultura non basta più. Gli operai del petrolchimico erano 35mila, today do not come to 7 thousand. " The small parties of the radical left, which have received some 'legacy of the old Communist Party (the three of the Rainbow, the first electoral disaster this year, almost 9 percent had policies)' have been closed in themselves and have fewer relationships with citizens, as the Democratic Party, has come to incorporate much of the Democratic leadership than once, taking on the mentality and methods. And the processor still reigns king, infecting a bit 'all, including men of the left: that once you get to have a modicum of power, such as counselors or advisors, lose his head and prepared to do anything to become self-perpetuating ...». The most striking example is to Rino Piscitello, the son of an old Communist deputy (among the protagonists of the facts of Avola, among other things) and he himself already more radical leftist, who arrived last month, after many slips (PCI, DP, Network, Margaret, Pd) in the ranks of the League of the South, Mpa Raffaele Lombardo. Voters disillusioned and with no alternatives The bitterness of Adorno is widely shared in what remains of the left Syracuse, the administration ended in mid-June to dismantle: between province and the city just elected a director, Ettore Di Giovanni - and only under his character to be "historical", for many years in common as the parent DS and consequently subject to many preferences personal. The province, where there was a council of the center with four councilors belonging Rainbow area, now there is not a counselor. "And you can not even talk about effect" useful vote "elections because they were administrative and were only later that it was already clear what had happened with the vote nationally in April," says Robert Fai, who teaches philosophy of law and lies a bit 'in the balance on the left of the Democratic Party. "The truth is that most leftists are refugees nell'astensionismo just not in a proposed alternative. I think this is an effect of being uprooted from the territory of the leaders of the left - all the best, for several years, hanno preferito carriere "romane" all'impegno nella loro città, e tutti i candidati locali qui sono stati catapultati dall'alto. Poi, quando l'Arcobaleno ha perso la sua rappresentanza nelle istituzioni - e nelle tv - nazionali, qui è scomparso del tutto dalla campagna elettorale per le amministrative, come se non esistesse affatto». E non è l'unico problema: ce ne sono anche di più strutturali, come il fatto che «mancano dei volti nuovi, nella sinistra alternativa, mancano delle figure di 30-40enni competenti e dinamici; ci sono sempre le stesse facce, gente in gamba e stimabile ma legata a periodi ormai passati».
Ci sono poi le critiche più esplicitamente politiche: come quelle che avanza Marina De Michele, insegnante di liceo con una lunga passione per il giornalismo d'inchiesta sul territorio, che esercita sul settimanale Il Ponte, una pessima esperienza di politica attiva nei Ds, un avvicinamento più recente al Pdci, dove «c'è un ambiente migliore e più solidarietà, anche se poi al fondo la mentalità e il costume politico non sono tanto diversi dagli altri: la politica è vista come mezzo per "piazzare" meglio se stessi e i propri amici e familiari». Marina cita due esempi per spiegare perché la sinistra siracusana ha perso presa tra i cittadini. Il primo è la vicenda dell'acqua: la Provincia - fino a giugno gestita dal centrosinistra - ha voluto a tutti i costi affidare la gestione delle risorse idriche, dopo una gara d'appalto highly questionable and it went empty, a company formally under public control, but in reality through an expansion of capital has become a de facto majority private. "On this matter there was a battle of environmentalists and citizens, in which the Democratic Party, Oh well ', it was openly in favor of privatization, while the PDCI and PRC were kept out in practice." And the second example is even more dramatic, the story of the marina building, "a crowd tens of thousands of square meters that will be taken from the sea, right on the waterfront city, creating hundreds of moorings and docks of the port for cruise ships. It 'an old project, now more than twenty years, who recently took over power, everything in the hands of Caltagirone, despite the evidence of environmental damage that would result, and despite the clear deficiencies of procedures are already in extensive operations speculation related to the project - just happened, it seems that a number of dilapidated buildings in the vicinity of the future port, have been bought by a notary Angelo Bellucci (husband of the Minister Prestigiacomo, ed.) Well, it seems that everything on the center-left bloc, has nothing to say. Opponents really in the end are only a few environmental organizations and citizens' committee. " As it has always been, after all: not by chance that the major battle ground policy is in town for half a century the urban-environmental, and names are now engaged in the same fund that the protagonists were in the 70s and 80s, from Caramel Mallorca (with its satirical paper The Isle of Dogs, but also with a series of investigative articles for the manifest and other newspapers) to Joseph Ansaldi (founder of Legambiente in Syracuse), lawyer Julian Conrad, stubborn denunciation of any building and environmental abuse. Even then, the marina was one of the key challenges of economic and political all'establishment (largely Democrat), together with the issue of preservation and restoration of the old town on the island of Ortigia, and even then the left parties, bound a concezioni industrialiste, seguivano solo distrattamente questi temi. Trovandosi peraltro spesso in diretto contrasto con l'ambientalismo quando si arrivava al nodo più duro, quello del polo petrolchimico e del rapporto tra lavoro e salute, tra sviluppo e ambiente.
Fatto sta che a questo punto, con il trionfo elettorale della destra, il passaggio del Pd sotto l'evidente egemonia di notabili ex democristiani, la distruzione di tutte le rappresentanze istituzionali della sinistra alternativa, il panorama politico siracusano si ritrova più chiuso e desolante che mai. Oltre a tutto - e più grave di tutto - in presenza di un serio peggioramento del clima civile. «A me pare che stia allargandosi sempre più una sorta di "cultura dell'illegalità" - dice Carmelo Maiorca - che raggiunge un po' tutti e contro cui è difficile lottare. E' la penetrazione della mafia e della mala catanese, ma è anche un contagio generale, lo si vede dalle piccole cose, la pesca illegale smerciata tranquillamente al mercato, il disinteresse e l'insofferenza per le regole, il fatto che siano stati eletti come niente fosse, nei consigli di circoscrizione, personaggi esplicitamente malavitosi...».
Serve una strategia di «resilienza»
Ben poche le vie percorribili che si intravedono: principalmente, quella dell'impegno sociale diretto, del volontariato, con tutti i limiti che questo comporta. «Occorre ormai una strategia di "resilienza" - dice l'antropologa Marilia Di Giovanni, impegnata tra the other in a draft-house shelter for women who have been abused - that improve the ability to overcome external shocks without breaking, adapting to new conditions. We must not lock ourselves into groups and closed circles, non-communicating, as today they are parties. Instead, we must take into living networks, committees, civic associations, all activities that leave the seeds among the people, and it is not easy. Now even institutions like the Bottega solidarity are becoming as "private" run with the idea that everything must remain in the hands of a closed group, such as a micropartito. So it's not going anywhere ...». Source: The Manifesto of July 27, 2008
