Sassari also celebrated this morning the Liberation from Nazi-fascism, which occurred 79 years ago. The symbolic date is April 25, when the Liberation Committee of Upper Italy proclaimed the general insurrection, overthrowing what remained of the Social Republic.
And it was the procession organized by the Anpi that kicked off the demonstrations today at 9.30am starting from the Garibaldi Hemicycle. In the lead was the “Luigi Canepa” band which led hundreds of citizens towards Piazza del Comune, crossing Via Carlo Alberto, Piazza d’Italia, Piazza Castello and then along Corso Vittorio Emanuele to reach Palazzo Ducale from Via Pais, Piazza Mazzotti, Via to the Duomo and Vicolo del Campanile. A long snake, which this year seemed more attended than usual.
In the square, on the upper side, the microphone station in front of the banner and the symbol of the Municipality, all around the representatives of the fighters’ and veterans’ associations. The entrance of the procession was greeted with the playing of the national anthem of Novaro-Mameli.
«Liberation Day is honored with the active participation of citizens, each in their own role, in the construction and maintenance of a coexistence pact that increasingly realizes and conforms to the values of our Constitution», said the prefect Grazia La Fauci , which opened the institutional interventions. Immediately afterwards, the president of the Sassari section of the Anpi, Thomas Arras, took the floor, and then Roberto and Angelica, students of the city’s secondary schools who took part in the “Auschwitz Reminder” project, promoted by Arci and the association Deina and financially supported by the municipal administration. “We hope that these words will not remain confined between the Polish barbed wires, but that they will fly far away and reach Gaza and all the places where further mass massacres are taking place at the moment”, concluded the two students.
At the end, the mayor Nanni Campus spoke. «Today, at the end of my second mandate, for the last time I have the honor of representing our City for you and with you in the celebration of Liberation Day. An anniversary which is the celebration of Freedom for everyone”, he began. Particularly applauded was the final step, with which the mayor wanted to put a stop to a controversy that has dragged on since 2001, at the beginning of his first mandate, when the ceremony on April 25th was canceled and the door of the municipal building remained closed. «For too many years, April 25th has been a source of division, of partisan exploitation – said Campus -. In the past, I too have succumbed to exploitation, making a sensational mistake, but, after years, the time is certainly ripe for us to move away from the partisan confrontation between winners and losers, now entrusted to history, to all without distinction feel like winners of freedom and democracy, of a precious legacy that the war of liberation has left us.”
The ceremony concluded with the traditional rendering of honors to the Fallen in the courtyard of Palazzo Ducale, where the plaque commemorating the date of 25 April 1945 is located. Here the crowns of the Municipality and the Province were placed.
