“Ours is a call for mobilization. Above all, those who live, work, produce and have roles of social and political representation in the South must take action to set up committees and collect signatures in order to reject a project that divides the country and accentuates inequalities”. This was stated by the general secretary of CGIL Puglia, Gigia Bucci, in launching the Apulian campaign against differentiated autonomy and calling together the various subjects who in recent months have already expressed opposition and concern for a reform which, with the approval in final approval in the Chamber and promulgation by the President of the Republic, it became state law.
“We were in the streets in February, together with many associations, mayors, parties, economists, the first in Italy to mobilize against the risk of a project “which hurts the South but weakens the whole country, this must be clear”, underlines Bucci . “It is not a North South issue, certainly what is feared as a secession of the richer regions will take place by taking away resources from the central State, in a phase of economic difficulty and a decline in spending on the national health system and social protection. At risk is the accounting of the Municipalities, the Regions, public health and education. There is a risk of losing that cornerstone of democracy and equality which is the national collective labor agreement. And those who pay the highest price will be the citizens of the South of the country. It will certainly not be the definition of the Lep – it is not known with what financial resources and to be defined on a historical expenditure that crystallizes the North-South divide – that will achieve substantial equality in the quantity and quality of services”.
Together with the proposal for the premiership, the CGIL further explains, “they represent a step towards the transformation of the very nature of our democracy and of the Constitutional Charter, born from the struggle for Liberation against Nazi-fascism. That Constitution that has kept the country united in many delicate phases of the Republic, which is inspired by values of solidarity and affirms the inviolable principle of equality between citizens, regardless of where one is born or chooses to live”.
“A principle today distorted by a law – says the Apulian CGIL – that empties the State of prerogatives on fundamental delegations for people’s lives: from education to health, from work to transportation. While we ask for more resources for health, to overcome waiting lists and extend territorial and social assistance services; while the country is called to develop coherent policies to address the digital, environmental and energy transitions; when precariousness and growing poverty demand good employment and wage increases, the right-wing government chooses to divide the country, to delegate functions and strategic decisions to individual regions, and in fact condemn the South and those who live there to an increasingly critical future. All this when the European Union itself had indicated among its priority objectives territorial cohesion and therefore to fill that gap in services and development that divides the South and the North of Italy”.
It is the reason why the CGIL Puglia calls all the social and political forces, the representatives of the institutions, the world of associations and civil and political commitment, “to give life to an extraordinary and widespread mobilization, establishing promoting committees in the territories of the referendum to repeal differentiated autonomy, thus starting the collection of signatures. It is a commitment to defend democracy, the Constitution, equality between territories and citizens. For a social model that looks at collective well-being starting from the people most in difficulty and that does not reward the selfishness of the rich. Coming out of this would be an overall more unjust and weak country. Let’s mobilize, now, immediately. In defense of the country’s unity and equal rights.”
