«We are patriots who know which way the flag is flying»: this is how Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, with an Italian flag projected behind her, decides live on Facebook to vindicate the government’s actions, the day after the result of the ballots which they saw the centre-left as favourites. The premise is to want to defend the project of differentiated autonomy, but the impression is that it is a message addressed directly to the oppositionagainst which he lashes out uncompromisingly, accusing her of using “irresponsible civil war tones”.
«The government’s work is moving forward at a rapid pace», despite «the ferocious opposition of those who, while saying that things are not going well in Italy, propose that the only program is to leave everything as it is», proclaims the Prime Minister, projecting a scenario of open conflict. «An M5s parliamentarian evoked Loreto for me: basically I should be massacred and hung upside down. And that’s not all: the left always sends out lists of proscriptions of southern parliamentarians who have approved differentiated autonomy to incite hatred against them. But I think that the violent words and ways that the left uses, not only on autonomy but on all the reforms carried out by this government, are ultimately nothing more than a desperate defense of the status quoa condition of privilege that has guaranteed some to the detriment of the majority of Italians.”
The secretary of the Democratic Party Elly Schlein responds piqued: «Civil war? These are not our tone, they never have been. I understand that it is difficult to accept yesterday’s 6-0 defeat and that we try to talk about something else. But I don’t know what Meloni is referring to». The Avs group leader also responds to the accusations: «Giorgia Meloni defines the opposition to their split-Italy law as ‘ridiculous and disorganized’. Here, President Meloni: from these aggressive tones we clearly understand that you and your government are in great difficulty and that you should recognize that you have made a huge mistake.”
But Meloni’s live broadcast is not just an attack on the opposition, it is also a vindication of the government’s work. If Schlein says that the ballots “are a clear signal to the government: reject the right-wingers who govern badly in the territories and also govern badly in Rome”, and fears that Meloni’s speech is an “attempt to distract attention from the results of the right», the Prime Minister lists the commitments «made with the Italians», underlining that she intends to «respect them» and listing the reforms launched «in less than 20 months».
Fisco, justice, procurement code and «above all that of the prime ministershipwhich has completed its first reading in the Senate and which will allow, if Italians so wish, to directly choose the head of government, putting an end to 70 years of instability, seaside governments, technical governments, rainbow governments, betrayed promises and transformism” . Against all these reforms, claims Meloni, «the left of every color is very unleashed. They obviously accuse us of every possible atrocity: on the tax reform, they said that we were friends of tax evaders and we brought home the record of recovery of proceeds from the fight against tax evasion. Proven.” On the justice reform, “they tell us they want to put the judiciary under the control of politics, but the reform provides that the members of the CSM are no longer elected by Parliament”. On the premiership, «they accuse us of authoritarian tendencies, but then it turns out that Achille Occhetto’s PDS, which was ahead of Schlein, also proposed it. And so here too: proven wrong”, says Meloni. «Is Occhetto ahead of me on reforms? Meloni seems a bit short on arguments to me”, replies Schlein.
«The most ridiculous thing is the left’s disorganized opposition to differentiated autonomy», insists Meloni, getting to the point. «To understand how sincere they are when they make this continuous accusation of wanting to split Italy or when in protest they wave the tricolor flags upside down in the chamber it is worth remembering some background facts», says the prime minister: «First, the idea of attributing greater autonomy to the regions that request it is not an invention of the centre-right, it is not an invention of the undersigned. Instead, it is a principle «inserted into our Constitution with the reform of Title V, reform launched in 2001, approved among other things by a majority vote under the government of Giuliano Amato, a left-wing government, and then confirmed by the Italians with the referendum”.
«That reform – he adds – was the culmination of a process begun in 1997 by the Prodi government and continued with the governments of Massimo D’Alema. So, if it was neither this government nor this majority that modified the Constitution by introducing the principle of differentiated autonomy, because it was already in the Constitution thanks to the left, what did we do? We have identified it a framework of rules within which it will be possible to implement the principle of differentiated autonomy”, he claims.
According to Meloni’s reconstruction, therefore, «they inserted it into their Constitution and never regulated it», despite several regions we have tried to adopt it, such as Lombardy, Veneto, Emilia Romagna. And “today the tricolors are waving and shouting scandal because we are trying to transform this principle, which is a correct principle, into a serious norm and that is, that it is capable of guaranteeing that disparities do not arise between territories”, he explains. The very clear reference is to the brawl that broke out in the Chamber during the debate on autonomy, when the opposition parliamentarians waved the flag and the grillino Lorenzo Donno was attacked.
«The full implementation of differentiated autonomy is a path that will be defined in the coming years, whether it will be done well or whether it will penalize someone to the advantage of someone else will actually depend on the actions of the regions, government and Parliament in the coming years, not on the framework law that has been approved”- he adds. «So – he underlines – if someone has objections to make it is right that they make them looking at the merit when the merit materializes, not in a closed box».
«In substance, however, what we did with the framework law was to establish under what conditions it is possible to grant the regions greater autonomy.” According to Meloni, the step forward was to define the essential levels of performance «that is, services that will have to be guaranteed throughout the national territory, because this is what has created the disparities we know about in Italy and that is the fact that no one has ever asked themselves the problem of establishing by law, region by region, what should be the minimum qualitative and quantitative levels of performance to be guaranteed, to ensure that there are no citizens of series A and citizens of series B”. The functions for the provision of certain additional skills may be transferred to the regions that request autonomy “only after these essential levels of performance have been defined, the costs established and the resources necessary to guarantee them established”. The essential levels provide that no one can have “worsening” conditions, he clarifies. A jab here also goes to the M5S: «The logic of citizenship income has divided Italy and has proven to be a failure. For the South we have made the bet to put it in a position to compete on equal terms.”
Differentiated autonomy, concludes Meloni, “is a measure that unites Italy, which fights disparities and makes the nation stronger and fairer throughout the national territory”.
But the reply from PD secretary Elly Schlein arrives immediately: «We are evaluating all possible avenues against differentiated autonomy. We discuss with the regions but also with the political, social and trade union forces. Differentiated autonomy splits the country in two. I heard what Meloni says but it clashes with the truth of the facts. It is a reform made without a euro, it means freezing and indeed increasing the country’s inequalities. They didn’t even try to pretend that it wasn’t the League’s old secessionist project. This is why I suggested changing the name of Fratelli d’Italia to Brandelli d’Italia. O brothers of half of Italy.”
