A group of girls and boys from the “Addiopizzo” association which operates in Palermo against the mafia
Twenty years ago, “Addiopizzo” was founded in Palermo, an association committed to fighting extortion and usury rackets. About fifty young people inspired by the example of the entrepreneur Libero Grasso, who at the cost of his life rebelled against the blackmail of Cosa Nostra, began at dawn on June 29, 2004 by launching a first campaign through hundreds of black-bordered adhesive posters affixed to the walls of the city on which was written: «A people who pay protection money is a people without dignity». A committee was then born. Then the “attacchi” organized a series of initiatives to assist traders, artisans and industrialists who had decided to report the extortion of which they were victims. The group’s activity subsequently expanded with incessant work in the area in the field of social inclusion and the fight against economic and educational poverty. «Because if we do not take charge of removing the conditions of degradation and poverty that contribute to fueling widespread illegality and the mafia power system, it is not enough to accompany and support the entrepreneurs who suffer the blackmail of the pizzo».
To celebrate their twentieth anniversary, last night the activists of “Addiopizzo” returned to the streets of the Sicilian capital with the aim of “renewing tradition” and “relaunching a new message”. “Over the course of these twenty years – we read in a note published on social media – there have been countless moments in which we have plastered the city of Palermo in the middle of the night. From the historic center to Brancaccio, from Noce to San Lorenzo passing through Resuttana, Pagliarelli and many other areas of the city with messages and content that also wanted to stimulate reflection. Twenty years later, last night saw us return to the streets, through the historic center of Palermo between Via Maqueda, Corso Vittorio Emanuele, Via Emerico Amari and Via Isidoro La Lumia. Places where in the last ten years there has been an urban, productive and social change whose impact is unprecedented in the history of Palermo. A change that has generated a new and important economy that has its pivot in the tourist use of the places in the historic center”. The intention of “Addiopizzo” was also to ask and share a question with the city community: “What economy for these city streets?”. “We have no claim to give answers but the desire, this time too, to open a reflection” they specified.
But how has reality changed in the meantime in this difficult socio-economic context, also thanks to the commitment of the courageous boys of “Addiopizzo”? It is the Palermo prosecutor Maurizio De Lucia who, in an interview, draws up a balance sheet of these twenty years: «We continue to record requests for protection money although, fortunately, in an increasingly less pervasive manner. The merit of Addiopizzo, whose twentieth anniversary we celebrate today, is to have built a system that has helped many operators to free themselves from the yoke that oppressed them. Now – the magistrate specified – the mafia think carefully about what their objectives are, that is, they only go to those who have shown availability towards them, keeping away from those who could report them”.
Today at 11.30 am, the inauguration of the exhibition “Addiopizzo 20” is also scheduled at the No Mafia Memorial in Corso Vittorio Emanuele.
