«We are facing yet another tragedy linked to hydrogeological instability. It hurts, but it hurts even more to see the statements of political exponents responsible for an amnesty like the one launched by the yellow-green government of Giuseppe Conte in 2018, also voted for by the Brothers of Italy» comments the mayor of Turin Stefano Lo Russo on the sidelines this morning of the ribbon cutting of the ‘Giardino del Sole’ of the Regina Margherita hospital. «It is even more sad that in this country the political forces deal with hydrogeological instability only when tragedies of this type happen – he adds -. It is a real drama, I believe that today we are in a complex situation due to what happened in the past: Conte’s amnesty in 2018 is the confirmation”.
Mayor Lo Russo thus returns to the words of Giuseppe Conte, guest of the Rai 3 broadcast “Half an hour more” twenty-four hours after the Ischia disaster. Pressed by Lucia Annunziata on the rule concerning the island, contained in the 2018 decree on the Genoa Bridge, the then prime minister of the yellow-green government replies: «I appreciate it because you have read article 25 of the decree on the bridge but I tell you that it wasn’t a pardon at all. It was a simplification procedure.
But something doesn’t add up. With article 25, which bears the word amnesty in the same name (“Definition of amnesty procedures”), the possibility was essentially given to reopen the terms of an old amnesty – that of 1985 – and to heal the abuses built up over the years .
«We will hardly be able to secure the building heritage, but we can do it with the lives of citizens – concludes Lo Russo -. I hope that it can be done with monitoring and warning systems, there is a lot of work to be done and we should consider the hypothesis of investing more in terms of prevention and hydrogeological instability especially in the most fragile areas”.
‘After the tragedy of Ischia there is the classic Italian-style rebound of responsibilities. Building amnesties have been made for 40 years and when someone tried to raise their voice they were silenced as ”the one who said no”. Ministers and other exponents of that policy at least spare us the contrite faces of pain. The national secretary of the Italian Left Nicola Fratoianni, a member of parliament of the Alliance Verdi Sinistra, writes on Twitter.
And the former M5S De Falco intervenes, saying he was kicked out because in the Commission he tried to block the rule on amnesty. “I had prepared an amendment which envisaged cutting the last words of article 25 where reference was made to law 47 of 1985, the so-called Craxi amnesty”. In the Commission «the amendment presented by the prozist senator Urania Papatheu, identical to mine, was put to the vote. The government – says the Captain of frigate – was beaten and that amendment passed. Four Forza Italia senators from Campania suspended themselves immediately, including De Siano and Cesaro. The following day in Aula Fi, after an internal turmoil, he returned to “military” in favor of the amnesties and then voted against “his own” amendment signed by Papatheu. Together with Fi they voted for the Lega and Movimento 5 Stelle». «All the M5S defended that rule, except me and Senators Nugnes and Fattori. The whole Movement moved like a tortoise, according to an expression evoked at the time by Luigi Di Maio”. «The vote on Ischia contributed to my expulsion. This was certified by the Movement itself in the reasons that accompanied my disciplinary measure. Conte had nothing to complain about that amnesty at the time, as did Salvini. Today they both stutter. Now the M5S leader is paying for his excessive aptitude for change – continues the former M5S senator, pointing his finger at the executive then in office -. The Ischia disaster weighs heavily on the shoulders of many subjects and the Conte I government is certainly co-responsible. The illegal houses did not generate the landslide but the houses built where they shouldn’t be have certainly increased the tragedy and probably contributed to making that territory even more fragile”.
“First we give a dignified burial to the, unfortunately, further victims and then we talk about responsibility and also about corrective measures because the current legislation needs concrete and sometimes even radical interventions”. Thus the Minister for Civil Protection and Marine Policies, Nello Musumeci, answers a question on the amnesties granted in Italy shortly before participating in the presentation of the Svimez 2022 report.