This morning, an ironic “circus” was staged in front of the RAI headquarters in Turin: seven Extinction Rebellion activists dressed as clowns appeared on tricycles in front of the entrance, while two other activists occupied the roof of the building from where they displayed a banner reading “G7 Environment: -2 days until the circus begins ”. Each of the 7 clowns held the flag of one of the seven G7 nations.
In fact, the protest takes place a few days before the ministerial summit of G7 on Climate, Energy and Environment, which will be held from 28 to 30 April in Venaria. «For more than thirty years, the G7 governments have made solemn commitments at international summits to combat climate collapse, despite continuing to invest in fossil fuels and fueling this crisis» explains Elisa. “It’s like being in front of a circus: their commitments, year after year, are a sad clown show.”
The protest arrives on the RAI roof to denounce at the same time the absence of serious information from the organization on the ecoclimatic crisis and the political pressure that the government has been exerting in recent months on thepublic information. The latter is a theme at the center of the political debate in recent days, among RAI journalists who have announced a strike for 6 May to protest against “the suffocating control over journalistic work” and the recent case of Antonio Scurati’s monologue on 25 April and on the assassination of Matteotti, which led to the talk of censorship. «We have chosen to be here at RAI today» continues Elisa «because public television should be at the service of citizens, informing in a serious and detailed way about the real gravity of the ecoclimatic crisis». However, despite the last year being the most warmer than ever, entire regions suffered extreme drought and numerous extreme meteorological events hit the whole of Italy, less than 3% of the Italian TV news stories concerned the climate and ecological crisis and, when they did, they did not mention the causes.
“The scale of the ecoclimatic crisis would require widespread information and the involvement of citizens in the political decisions to be made. Those who govern, however, surround themselves with red zones, making the distance from the citizens whose interests they should represent even more evident.” A theme, that of the distance between citizens and political and economic decision makers, claimed by Extinction Rebellion a few days ago also on the occasion of the Intesa Sanpaolo shareholders’ meeting.
While the Italian government announces the new national energy plan, the so-called Mattei plan, based on the extraction and transport of gas and oil, and in all G7 governments the abandonment of fossil fuels is still too slow and gradual, Turin is preparing to host yet another international summit.
Will it be yet another failure?
