What (really) happens to the League
Objectives and challenges of the League celebrating 40 years. Paola Sacchi's note
Matteo Salvini's response to the "excommunication" of his political father, founder of the Northern League on the occasion of the fortieth anniversary of the Lombardy autonomist League, is marked by diplomacy and also by sincere affection. Regardless of what the "journalists" say who rejoice at the trenchant words of the "Boss" who, during the pilgrimage last Saturday of around a hundred militants, former parliamentarians and former Northern League ministers, to his home in Gemonio, attacks: "The League needs another leader ”. And, like an ancient habit, it relaunches the name of Giancarlo Giorgetti.
It is obvious to imagine that Salvini was not pleased with the "dismissal" by the Senatùr, who, however, unlike some participants in the pilgrimage who were re-elected in parliament with the National League Salvini-premier and no longer re-nominated, has never made a secret since beginning to not share Salvini's National League project at all.
Bossi is Bossi. One thing is he "the commoner" who revolutionized politics by giving voice to the man in the street of that North tired of paying only taxes and receiving nothing back, another thing are the many, perhaps too many, who said nothing to a much more Salvini powerful with numbers, over 30, which more or less expounded the same ideas that are criticized now. Why also sincere affection, despite the obvious irritation? Salvini is one of those guys from Bossi known as the "Boss", a leader who didn't joke about expulsions and who honestly was a bit scary even to seasoned Transatlantico di Montecitorio reporters, who, as he himself said at night, made nasty phone calls that “They woke up my parents and then took it out on me.”
Same fate for all the others who kept a pen and paper on their bedside table at night so as not to be caught off guard. One of these was Roberto Cota, former president of Piedmont, now in Forza Italia, as well as with FI, as an independent, the former group leader in the Chamber Marco Reguzzoni, an early Northern League liberal, also liquidated by the League of Roberto Maroni with the evening justice of the brooms for the Belsito affair as one of the leaders of the much infamous "magic circle". It should be remembered that Rosi Mauro, former Sinpa trade unionist, former vice-president of the Senate, who left politics, was acquitted of the infamous diamond charges. A story that will probably have to be completely rewritten, including Maroni's completely justicialist approach, as the reporter has written several times and told the interested party himself, who had other entirely political merits in the League, starting with having been an excellent Minister of the Interior .
In any case, Salvini, as he had already done in the heat of Saturday evening, does not fall into the trap of those who are not up to Bossi's level, whose positions may be questionable, but he certainly cannot be denied having said them to the direct's face interested including the adjective "fascist" a few years ago during a lively federal council while others were silent. Moreover, Bossi once interrupted a meeting in which he arrived at the last minute with a faff to Giorgetti himself who, however, seems to have responded in kind, perhaps the only one in the League authorized to respond in kind to the "Boss", a bit like Gianni Letta with Silvio Berlusconi. This is why Salvini's reply yesterday from the party in Varese for the fortieth anniversary of the Lombard League founded by Bossi, his future wife Manuela Marrone, and four other bold people is certainly not hypocritical or superficial: "Bossi (who didn't go to Varese ed. ) can say everything,” he underlined. In other words, I accept everything from him. Already on Saturday evening, after having been accused of having betrayed the North by some participants in the Gemonio demonstration, including the former Minister of Justice, Roberto Castelli, a lifelong Bossian, Salvini had replied in a Zen way: "All criticisms of Umberto Bossi I have been used to for thirty years, I also talk about it in my book which will be released at the end of April. I listen to them with attention and gratitude, I only reply that seeing him healthy is the best gift for this holiday."
Then yesterday in Varese at the celebrations of the first forty years of the League Salvini had Roberto Calderoli next to him who recalled the achievement of Autonomy, the corporate name of the League, the Lombard governor Attilio Fontana and Giorgetti himself, nominated by Bossi among the future secretaries (he also did it with the undersigned in an exclusive interview for Panorama in 2006, where he threatened in the hands-free CDL), who reiterated the values of "militancy and discipline not to be confused with servility".
Salvini, announcing the release of his new book, also addressed his thoughts to “Roberto Maroni who, with Umberto Bossi, started everything and taught me so much. The courage and visionary nature of those who gave birth to the League changed my life and the history of Italy." It is the dedication he makes to "Bobo" and the great "Capo Padano" in the book "Controvento", 272 pages, Piemme publishing house, with unpublished photos that retrace the human and political history of the Northern League leader. The volume, already eighth in the bestseller category on Amazon, will be presented by Salvini himself on April 25th. “Italy capable of creating wealth, a friend of the productive world and an enemy of bureaucracy, modern and federal, has always been Umberto Bossi's dream,” writes Salvini in Controvento . “He gave us the right fuel, the ideas, the motivation and the words to say it. I had heard it many times at the rally. I felt like I knew him. And I repeated within myself what I would have liked to say to him, to support him and to have encouragement. But the first time I met him was more than thirty years ago, in the early nineties. I saw him in the League headquarters in via Vespri Siciliani. There were many of us and he came to tell us that we would soon win the elections in Milan. And we were there thinking: this guy is crazy, he's a visionary. I had Daniele Vimercati's book, Lombardi alla nuova crociata, on my bedside table. But Umberto was right. 1993: our Marco Formentini beating Dalla Chiesa”.
But in Varese, under the first Northern League headquarters, the federal secretary, deputy prime minister and minister of Infrastructure-Transport, praising Maroni who "took it in hand in the most difficult moment", also essentially recalled that he saved the League "which risked its end". Deputy secretary Andrea Crippa is very close to Salvini: “Bossi founded the League, Salvini saved it. If there is a choice, I choose Salvini." And the "captain": "Even Bossi's insults (who had already challenged Salvini in the primaries, ed. ) serve to improve me." The updated and revised 'Padano' novel continues.
Who knows, sooner or later Salvini and Bossi will talk to each other again.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/lega-dichiarazioni-bossi-salvini/ on Mon, 15 Apr 2024 05:54:28 +0000.