A boat of migrants rescued by the Coast Guard – ANSA
On the proposal of Minister for Civil Protection and Marine Policies Nello Musumecithe government has approved a state of emergency throughout the country following the exceptional increase in the flow of migrant people through the Mediterranean routes.
The state of emergency, supported by an initial loan of five million euros, will last six months. This measure it allows to allocate ad hoc funds but also to attribute extraordinary powers to the governmentwhich can, therefore, issue ordinances derogating from the rules in force.
According to government sources, the declaration of a state of emergency it allows to ensure more effective and timely responses in terms of the management of migrants and their accommodation on the national territory. The same sources point out that the number of landings is much higher than in the past.
And again it is pointed out that the emergency state can be used to speed up rejections. This however, here are the doubts of those who deal with migrants and their reception, could be used to implement easy expulsionsperhaps without considering well the legal status or the human situation of those who arrived in Italy fleeing situations of war, hunger, persecution, serious human or civil degradation.
It remains to be seen how it will be applied and with what objectives. Past state of emergency experiences have not always achieved truly positive results.
“We have gladly complied with the request of the Minister of the Interior Matteo Piantedosi, well aware – Musumeci said – of the seriousness of a phenomenon which is registering a 300 percent increase. Let me be clear, the problem will not be solved, the solution of which is linked only to a conscious and responsible intervention by the European Union”.
In the last 20 years, the state of emergency has been declared 128 times. It is generally linked to meteorological events or earthquakes. It was also declared for the Covid pandemic, allowing the personal freedom of Italians to be limited for health reasons.
Perego (Migrantes): it can be useful, but something else is also needed
“I believe that the declaration of a state of emergency on the one hand could be useful for accelerating the transfer of people who to a greater extent this year, three times as many, are reaching the coasts of Lampedusa above all. However, this state of emergency must not make forget a fact: the reception system in Italy needs to be strengthened; and at the same time we must not give the perception that the migrants and refugees who are arriving are an emergency problem, in the sense that we cannot go deeper into it and address it within a context that is perhaps broader and more attentive. Not forgetting that the emergency costs much more than the normal receptionMonsignor Giancarlo Perego, president of the Migrantes Foundation (pastoral body of the Italian Episcopal Conference), stated this on Vatican Radio during the broadcast Il Mondo on the radio.
“So on this side I think right now it needs to be evaluated with a lot of attention if extraordinary tools are needed, or if on the one hand a series of additional actions should not be implemented with respect to those already in place for the eviction of Lampedusa – added Perego – And at the same time, which is truly the most important and necessary, to strengthen and expand the reception plan in the various Italian regions”
More severe fines for those who deface monuments
“Without prejudice to the applicable penal sanctions, anyone who destroys, disperses, deteriorates or renders in whole or in part unusable or unusable their own or others’ cultural or landscape assets is expected to be punished with the administrative sanction of paying a sum from 20,000 euros to 60,000 euros“. This is foreseen by the first paragraph of article 1 of the draft of the bill which contains “Sanctioning provisions on the matter of destruction, dispersion, deterioration, disfigurement, soiling and illicit use of cultural or landscape assets”, landed today in the CDM.
State of emergency, that’s what it means
Tackling a disaster with extraordinary means and powers, from humanitarian crises to natural events such as earthquakes or floods. This is the objective of the declaration of the ‘state of emergency’: an administrative act regulated by the Civil Protection Code which must be approved by the Council of Ministers on a proposal from the Prime Minister, as has occurred in recent hours due to the exceptional increase in flows of migrants through the Mediterranean routes.
At the moment in Italy about twenty measures of this type are in force, from the emergency of refugees in Ukraine to various cases of floods, often decided even after the request of the president of a Region or of an Autonomous Province concerned. The only precedent in the field of migrants dates back to 2011 with the Berlusconi government and provided for a plan for the equitable distribution of refugees from North Africa in the regions, even if at the time the law provided for different rules.
The national state of emergency is regulated by article 24 of the Civil Protection Code on the basis of certain requisites defined in article 7: “emergencies of national importance connected with calamitous events of natural origin or deriving from human activity which in due to their intensity or extension they must, with immediate intervention, be faced with extraordinary means and powers to be employed during limited and predefined periods of time”.
With the declaration of a state of emergency, a commissioner can be appointed who has the task of carrying out the interventions envisaged by the declaration: overcoming the emergency, reducing the residual risk, restoring essential services and assisting the population. In this case, therefore, a new temporary arrangement of powers emerges, with resolutions not subject to the preventive legitimacy control of the Court of Auditors.
The resolution also establishes an allocation of financial resources to be allocated to urgent interventions and to be drawn from the Fund for national emergencies, which can be progressively increased during the duration of the state of emergency. The provision may also have a local or regional significance only. When it is of a national nature, it does not exceed twelve months and can be extended for a maximum of another twelve months: beyond these times, a law must be passed through parliamentary passage.