Well yes, the Ministry of Culture of the center-right government has admitted to the financing of the PNRR projects a multimedia center dedicated to Pietro Ingrao and the history of the Communist Party in the province of Latina. The man who presented it, while he says it, cries. Marrigo Rosato took no more than a week to send the application to the call for the Attractiveness of Historic Villages. Because he already had everything ready, at home: photos, videos, posters, speeches, resolutions, conference proceedings, notes, articles, demonstrations, posters that in many cases he himself compiled or brought to print, then posted on the walls of Lenola, Sperlonga, Formia, Fondi, Sezze, Roccagorga. “I didn’t want to keep all that material just for myself and I didn’t have the strength to organize a cultural center that was also an archive of the memory of the left in the province of Latina. – he says – So, when I saw the Pnrr announcement I understood that we, Lenola, had what it takes to try to line up the pieces of a movement that was not at all subordinate to the right”.
I remind you that Latina is recognized as a black province, however right-wing.
“I reply that there is nothing more imprecise. The right, or rather the center-right, has only been better at narrating and always putting events like the reclamation or similar in the foreground. But the heart of this province beats to the left and when the cultural center of Lenola is open to the public no one will be able to deny it anymore.”
Besides the speeches and photos of Pietro Ingrao, a name of unquestionable excellence on the left, what does he bring to the table in this ‘counter-narrative’?
“First of all, I want to say that a path is now starting, in fact the Polo-multimedia space is integrating with the Ingrao Fund at the Lenola municipal library and thus a collaboration with the ‘Pietro Ingrao’ association is opening. I thank all those who collaborated in defining the Project, the CRS-Pietro Ingrao Foundation that shared it, and I am sure that together we will achieve something great in view of the tenth anniversary of Pietro’s death, in 2025, to contribute to his memory. Then, look, the left and the PCI have been able to count on excellent names of a movement of workers and farmers, simple people and illustrious intellectuals. I will only make a short list of the leaders of the PCI and friends of Pietro Ingrao who in the 50s-60s-70s marked the political history of this territory: Manfredo Tretola, mayor of Roccagorga, Franco Caporindi, historical leader of the PCI, Franco Spelta, driver for the PCI Federation of Latina of Pietro Ingrao, Sandrino Di Trapano, Mario Berti, Giovambattista Giorgi, Franco Luberti, Aldo D’Alessio, Vittorio Cotesta, Sandro Bove, Sandro Bartolomeo».
You were a personal friend of Ingrao, right?
“Yes, we were both from Lenola but we didn’t know each other. I was an inexperienced student in Naples, where one day he held a rally packed with classmates. I went to wait for him on the steps behind the stage and told him: ‘We are fellow countrymen’. He stopped to talk to me for more than half an hour and in the end we arranged to meet the following summer at his house, in Lenola. I actually went and an extraordinary friendship was born. That’s how I started to get involved in politics in the Youth Federation and then in the PCI. I believe that having lived those intense years of debate and civil commitment in what remains the PCI enclave, was a great fortune for me as well as an extraordinary experience. All this should not and must not be lost.”
When will it be possible for “normal people” to access this red cultural hub?
“I think soon, certainly within the timeframe set by the project. We want to tell you another story of the province of Latina and it will be a gift for the tenth anniversary of Pietro’s death, in September 2025. I would like a rally to be held in the center of the town, like the ones Pietro attended so many times. This country and this province need not to forget political passions.”
