by Wainer Preda
«Lies», «falsehood», «lies». The center-left does not mince words to define the campaign hatched by some members of the Lega and Fratelli d’Italia against the municipal administration of Bergamo and the candidate for mayor Elena Carnevaliguilty, according to them, of having promised five mosques in the city to the Islamic community.
The statement, already bizarre in itself, speaks for itself. And yet, from word of mouth, from media to media, it reached television. In this case on Rai 3 and Rete 4, national networks. Becoming clear truth for the good-mouthed public who delights on social media. So much so that the city planning councilor, Francesco Valesiniwas forced to reply and make a series of clarifications that leave little room for the imagination.
First of all, the Municipality has never talked about the construction of five mosques in Bergamo. Those, at best, are electoral propaganda. In reality, the councilor explained, the Regional law requires that within the PGT (territorial government plan voted in the City Council and therefore known for months) there are also “spaces equipped for religious worship”.
Spaces, not mosques. Religious cult, not Islamic community. Which means that those spaces are available to all the confessional communities present in Bergamo: Catholic, Orthodox, Mormon, Evangelical Church, Islamic and so on.
The Municipality asked, with a public tender, if there were citizens willing to make buildings available in which to go and pray. Five responded. One didn’t qualify, four remained. Who offered the availability of a property in via Corti (perpendicular to San Bernardino), another in via Arnoldi (a closed-end road in the Campo Coni area), yet another in via Canove (in Campagnola) and a final near the former Fervet in via Rovelli. All peripheral buildings.
Now, how four became five is a low-grade propaganda trick. As much as the places of worship have become – it’s a surprise, it’s a simple trick – mosques tout court. That’s not true, of course.
However, it is true that religious freedom is guaranteed by article 19 of the Constitution. Which states: «Everyone has the right to freely profess their religious faith in any form, individual or associated, to propagandize it and to practice its worship in private or public (…)
