The figure printed on the black shirts is distantly reminiscent of the “wanted” posters of the Old West. The face above is that of Minister Salvini, “guilty” (written in capital letters) of only one thing: “Having defended Italy”. A provocation while a few kilometers away the final speech of the lawyer Giulia Bongiorno, Salvini’s lawyer in the Open Arms Trial, is being held. The accusation is of “kidnapping” for the ban imposed on the Spanish NGO in the summer of 2019 by the then Interior Minister Salvini from disembarking 147 migrants rescued in the Mediterranean. A crime for which the prosecution requested a 6-year sentence.
Starting at 9.30 am, ministers and political representatives of the League from all over Italy gathered in Palermo to demonstrate their solidarity with the minister. An essential set mounted in Piazza Castelnuovo in the heart of the city, where all the newspaper editorial offices are based and where the economic and cultural world transits, lives and works: a small gazebo to distribute the t-shirts which are sold out even among those who think differently (“because it is a historical document”, someone comments) and two loudspeakers to listen to the speech of the lawyer Bongiorno live.
But that’s it. Apart from party colleagues and journalists (many of them), the call for solidarity for Salvini, pace the organizers, did not turn into a popular event. Rather, it was a media event made up of “Matteo, Matteo” chants and built around article 52 of the Constitution, printed on the back of the t-shirts: “The defense of the homeland is the sacred duty of the citizen” complete with the hashtag #iostoconsalvini. Then a series of short declarations of solidarity. “Being there is a dutiful act for those who believe in their politics” says, among others, the education minister Giuseppe Valditara. The ANM instead speaks of a “climate of media tension” while the prosecutor Giorgia Righi, one of the magistrates who represents the prosecution, the escort was assigned after the insults received from the magistrates following the request for conviction for Salvini.
The tom tom with the invitation to be present it started on Monday on the League’s social and WhatsApp channels. Five days to gather participation but above all to underline the importance of everyone being present.
Enough to reignite the political-judiciary clash and turn the spotlight of the Italian media back on the case. Salvini in the courtroom. The Northern League ministers in the square with the gadget t-shirt and the pin with the Warrior of Legnano on the jacket: from Roberto Calderoli (Regional Affairs and Autonomies) to Francesco Valditara (Education and Merit), from Giancarlo Giorgetti (Economy and Finance, whose presence first that he returned to Varese, stopwatch in hand, was 90 seconds) to Alessandra Locatelli (Disability). Also in the square were deputies, senators and regional parliamentarians.
The count of those present at the demonstration at the end of the morning was made by the regional secretary of the party Nino Minardo who thanked the “95 deputies, ministers and MEPs who came to Palermo”. In the end, the lawyer Bongiorno asks for “acquittal because the fact does not exist”. Set disassembled. Everyone at home. Hearing postponed to December 20th.