Today, in Piazza della Libertà, at the committee of Antonio Gengaro, candidate for mayor of the progressive “Campo Largo” front, the meeting called “the self-convocation to reflect on April 25th” was held. “I just want to remember one thing: Avellino was also a city of anti-fascists. Guido Dorso first, who was then denied the editorship of the Corriere dell’Irpinia, and then I also want to remember three fathers of our history who were arrested after 8 September: professor Federico Biondi, Antonio Maccanico and Camillo Marino. They fought for democracy and freedom and were incarcerated in our Bourbon prison. This whole world is ideally behind me, behind us. I hope to have the pride, the dignity, the depth to be able to represent all this.”
The conversation, obviously, quickly turned towards the candidacy for mayor: “I was a candidate to counter the former mayor Festa where a normal condition had recurred for the elections. There is an enormous moral question that has fallen on the city we talked about Avellino, a city that had closed in on itself, had been reduced to a dimension of self-referentiality, ‘a big town’. We are also talking about a worrying demographic decline for our province, for our city: today we have 52,000 inhabitants. We need to do very deep work, from the bottom up, in perspective, in the medium or long term, because there is no magic formula, but at the center of my political action will be the future of young people, work, improvement of the social conditions of the city. There is a city that I define as ‘the city of hardship’, which needs not to feel alone; it must have the institutions, the Municipality, the Area Plan, the ASL, at its side; the hospital, so we need to network among these mountains because only together, with a ruling class, can we solve problems that make veins and wrists tremble.”
Yesterday, the candidates of “Viva” and “Really” confirmed their entry into the field even without the presence of the former mayor: “They are all characters who in recent years have not seen, have not heard, have not spoken. .. Did Festa do it all alone? Did Festa alone determine this condition? And what about the others who were at his side, mostly with him? that they don’t understand. Festa is the scapegoat in this affair, but Festa had accomplices, he had followers. I’m very sorry for the conditions in my city, I want to give a sign of hope. The judiciary didn’t just hit Festa a clockwork judiciary, there was a good investigation and there is a good investigation into Alto Calore. In Italy we have the presumption of innocence guaranteed by the Constitution until proven guilty Fifteen, dismissed for Camorra. A condition in which someone like me, who has a certain experience, a certain competence in administrative matters, is probably called precisely in this context, but I said it, I’m not Mr. Wolf. Pulp Fiction’, I cannot solve the problems alone, I need to be accompanied first of all by my community, by the people of Avellino and then by a ruling class that takes charge of the problems in the city of Avellino, together with me”.
The Prefect Paola Spena Say hello to Avellino, he will be Extraordinary Commissioner for the recovery of assets confiscated from organized crime. Antonio Gengaro doesn’t seem to have a good memory of it: “He could have done something more, not waited for parliamentary questions, gotten involved in some matters concerning legality and transparency within a local authority. The principle of legality, the principle of transparency , are exiles from the Municipality of Avellino and therefore it is the first thing that must be reported. The Municipality must return to a glass house, the citizens must know, every day, what their administrators do, what decisions they make, what interests they deal with. I will take care of the public interest of the citizens, I will fight for a change of mentality. In the public interest in that framework there is also the ability to solve the individual problem, because the people in need, the least fortunate, must be helped by the community, by the community. administration, there is no doubt about this, but there are no privileges, there must be no shortcuts. We must be a city open to dialogue. There is a network of relationships to be rebuilt. There’s a team here, not just one man in charge. I am the representative of an alliance of parties, traditional, historic parties, which have statutes, which have codes of ethics, so I am the mayor in this context. Then there is the best of Avellino-Irpinia associations and culture. I am in this context.”
The mayoral candidate of the progressive front, in closing, harshly addresses D’Agostino and Petitto. The latter, in particular, is defined as ‘the clear example of the transformist’: “Obviously, I believe that many disillusioned Festa voters are not right-wing, nor will they close themselves in transformism, nor will they be able to support those who were with Festa and who today they run away pretending that in recent years they have not been in the city of Avellino. To name two, D’Agostino has placed himself in the frame of Forza Italia, until six months ago he was with Festa, and Petitto But Petitto how many forces policies, how many components has he changed in his life? It is precisely the example of political transformism. If one wanted to define a transformist, what is a transformist? gentlemen. I think that these will think first of the interests of the city of Avellino and then of other conveniences”.
