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I tried!
Yes, I tried to have faith, and I really worked with all my strength, with great perseverance and insistence, as far as inopportunity, to have my European project enter the Italian political agendas with a view to the European elections in June, but I failed.
I tried to have them understand the importance and the urgency, in our times, to assure the digital citizenship (hence, first of all, the broadband connectivity) to all European citizens, business and institutions to allow them to actively participate, as protagonists, in the Knowledge Society, for a forward-looking Europe.
I tried to have them understand the wonderful chances lying before us, but also the immense risks of doing nothing.
But I failed.
During these last weeks, I maintained a due reserve. In fact, it seemed as if something was moving, at last. There has been an interest from some important national representatives, mainly from the Partito Democratico (Democratic Party), and from other parties as well.
I would like to thank those hundreds people who supported me.
I would like to thank Mr. Romano Prodi who wrote me no less than two letters in his own hand to support me – I will be proud to show them to Camilla when she grows up.
I would like to thank Mr. Hans-Gert Pöttering, the President of the European Parliament for his words of assessment, and of spur to go on.
I am sorry, but all that has been useless. At last, the parties’ nominations have been decided by the same old few names according to the same old self-referential logics, careless of the people’s will, without considering merits and proposals.
I have always thought that to be politically involved means to realize concrete ideas and projects to improve citizens’ life. All the rest is party hacks’ idle chatter.
During these last few months, I wanted to blindly give credit to the political class, devoting time, strength and skills in writing and promoting a strong and concrete project, disregarding (shutting my eyes and ears) those voices around me telling I was wasting my time, nothing would have changed, because there were the same old names to whom a position had to be assured.
I wanted to give credit to the new governing political class of thirty, forty-year-old people. I would have expected they had that healthy young anger and desire of slam their fists on the table, metaphorically speaking, claiming their right in choosing priorities and names.
Far from that!
Unfortunately, I am now forced to realize the voices were right.
Mind you, I am not angry for they did not consider my project, but for they simply preferred names without any proposal or idea, without any territorial representation. They did not evaluate merits and obtained results. They simply chose names already covering roles obtained perhaps without any specific merit.
The funny thing is that some party representatives hurried to write me hoping their party could be an “interlocutor” to me, without even understanding that interlocution implies a dialogue, not simply a monologue.
And to think that I was positively struck by the words of a leader such as Dario Franceschini and the young rising stars of the PD (Democratic Party) who said that quality, expertise and merit had to be the criteria for the choice of the candidates.
But other parties as well said the same things, just to keep up.
Borrowing from the great Totò, the only comment I can do is,
Honourable, do me a favour !!
(Onorevole, ma mi faccia il piacere!)
Now, my prevailing feeling is of bitter disappointment.
In this very moment, there is a passage from the movie Mediterraneo which perfectly describes my mood,
There is Italy to be rebuilt, we have to start over again.
There is a great mess under the sky, this is an excellent situation.
Come on, we are going to make a wonderful country to live in, I promise you.
Hey, come on, that’s our duty too !
… forty years later,
They let us change nothing.
And then, and then I told them “You win, but you won’t succeed in having me as your accomplice at least”.
(Sergeant Nicola Lorusso)
Set yourselves at rest, I’m not one who gets dejected so easily. Let some months elapse, and I’ll be back with my usual fighting spirit.
Just for now, I ring down the curtain, and fall into the ranks of the so-called silent civil society, so much mentioned in the politicians’ speeches, but from which, I realized it, they are so far and deaf.
Hence, people’s disaffection!
Well, my project will be, most likely, pursued by a candidate from Northern Europe: congratulations!
Meanwhile, the European Union has lately allocated 1 billion Euros for the development of broadband in Europe, money to be assigned to the Governments without notice of competition (since the amount will join the funding for the Programmes of Rural Development) and without, for the moment being, setting the minimum band and quality service levels to be complied with – see a paper of mine on this topic.
What makes me angry is that nobody will be there to monitor, and “to stop leaks”, and we will risk to lose not only a wonderful chance, but also heaps of money.
At the end of this earnest and natural outlet, I would like to underline that whoever will commit him/herself to those topics will have my full support and my complete cooperation; as I already said, I was simply interested in going ahead with a project for our future.
And in the coming weekend, at last, I am planning my holidays … of the beginning of June!
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