PHOTO | VIDEO Two thousand people in Genoa against major works, even Conte at the tail end of the procession
At the demonstration there were also writings against the governor Giovanni Toti, who has been under house arrest for corruption since Tuesday: "Arrogant, overbearing, we don't want you anymore"
GENOA – At least two thousand demonstrators took to the streets this afternoon in Genoa for the “In Liguria we demonstrate united” procession. A protest organized for some time by a hundred (and not almost two hundred as circulated in recent days) of committees that oppose the “great works lowered from above”. Claims that are inevitably intertwined with the judicial storm that has hit Liguria since last Tuesday, with the arrest of the governor Giovanni Toti. The leader of the 5 Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, joins the tail end of the march, even though the demonstrators have asked that there be no political exploitation. “This is a demonstration of citizens and committees – explain the organizers – no political organization participated. We do not want exploitation of our claims”. And they add that the judicial issue that involved the Region is “an aspect connected only occasionally”. Then, however, they add: “This regional administration must go and the left-wing politicians must listen to us, otherwise they will disappear too.” The organisers, mindful of other demonstrations in the previous days, ask everyone not to use smoke bombs and deface walls and streets with spray-on graffiti.
CORTEO LEAVES A MESSAGE TO TOTI: BULLY, WE DON’T WE WANT MORE
At the end of the procession in Piazza De Ferrari, a message remains: “Arrogant, overbearing, we no longer want you as president”. Accompanied by the exhortation: “Let Liguria live”. The writing was left on a banner hanging from a barrier in front of the entrance to the Palazzo della Regione. The recipient is the governor Giovanni Toti, who has been under house arrest for corruption since Tuesday.
CONTE: INTOLERANTS OF CONTROLS, SET UP FEEDERS
“Today we have majority forces that systematically want to accelerate all projects, but loosen all anti-corruption measures. The truth is that today this government does not tolerate controls. Whether it is Anac, the Court of Auditors or the judiciary, everywhere it is flourishing of rules aimed at eliminating investigative tools, forms of control: there is an intolerance to controls, but in this way we are preparing a manger for the business committees, the entrepreneur friends, for the patronage systems that are spreading from North to South “. Thus the leader of the 5 Star Movement, Giuseppe Conte, today in Genoa. “I remember my experience of government – he adds – Genoa suffered a terrible wound: the collapse of the Morandi Bridge. We all worked hard to recover from this wound. And I must say that with an ad hoc decree, with great political responsibility we managed to achieve an engineering jewel that gave us a positive image of Genoa, Liguria and Italy before the whole world, we did by inserting strengthened anti-corruption and legality measures into that decree, given the limited times.” But, he concludes, “it is clear that we cannot think that all infrastructures can be created very quickly and at the expense of controls”.
CONTE: IT SHOULD NOT BE SURPRISE, I HAD ALREADY LAUNCHED THE MORAL QUESTION< /strong>
“It shouldn’t surprise you. What is emerging in Liguria is emerging in Piedmont, Puglia, Sicily, in many other areas of our country. Since the beginning of December I have raised the moral question, I tell everyone: who has received my appeal when I reported widespread malpractice, mafia political exchange, mafia infiltration, corruption? Are they setting up a trough for the Pnrr”, explains the leader of the 5 Star Movement. “We brought those resources with everyone’s sacrifice and now let’s ask ourselves where they are going – he adds – the first signs are terrible. The European prosecutor’s office has launched over 200 investigations, 86% concentrated in Italy. We are already talking about a scam involving Pnrr money of over 600 million”. And so, concludes the former prime minister, “I say to all the political, social and cultural forces that they must question themselves and try to find antibodies and antidotes, not remain indifferent or even try to stifle a healthy democratic debate that brings legality back to the center , transparency, the fight against all forms of corruption”.
CONTE: TOTI’S RESIGNATION ALREADY ASKED, REGION SERVES GOOD POLICY
Should Toti resign? “We have already said this. The President of the Region is under house arrest and the Region needs to be governed by good politics,” Conte said. “The investigation is expanding – continues the leader of the 5 Star Movement – I, beyond the criminal responsibility which will be ascertained with all the guarantees of a fair trial, because we are the maximum guarantors and we would never allow ourselves at this moment to draw assessments of culpability, I’m just saying that a political system emerges, as a whole, which expresses a perverse intertwining of politics and business, a widespread malpractice”.