ROME LETTER:Every year on April 25th there are bitter arguments over who was on the right side of Italy's civil war, writes PADDY AGNEW
APRIL 25th never passes unnoticed in Italy. It is the day that marks La Festa della Liberazione, the day when Italians recall how in April 1945, the partigiani (resistance movement) and the Allies finally liberated Italy from Nazi-fascist and Mussolini-fascist rule.
In a handful of dramatic days, cities such as Bologna, Parma, Reggio Emilia, Milan, Turin and finally Genoa were liberated from the Nazis through a general insurrection called by the partisans, concurrent with a renewed Allied offensive.
In all the time that your correspondent has been in Italy, this is a day that never fails to arouse controversy.
Every year is marked by bitter arguments about who was on the “right side” of what ended up as a two-year civil war in Italy between fascists and anti-fascists, between those who threw in their lot with Mussolini’s Nazi puppet state of Salò (1943-1945) and those partisans who fought alongside the Allies.
As the Irish know only too well, civil war is very ugly, pitting brother against brother, father against son and leading to atrocity after atrocity, betrayal after betrayal. In Italy, the years 1943 to 1945 were no exception.
Even now, 64 years on, one senses that Italians have not begun to reach closure on this matter. Perhaps they never will. Perhaps the pain and anger will finally fade, cured not so much by latter day truth and reconciliation commissions but simply by the passing of time.
To some extent, of course, given the time span, that has already happened.
April 25th, 2009, however, may in time be seen to have made its own important contribution to ending the polemics thanks to – surprise, surprise – the gesture and words of prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.
In 15 years in public life, Berlusconi until last weekend had never attended one of the many public commemorations that mark this special day. Last year the then newly elected prime minister spent the 25th in his Rome residence of Palazzo Grazioli.
As the man who brought the neo-fascists (MSI) in from the cold in 1993 and as someone who has spent a political lifetime railing against communists, the prime minister has always seemed reluctant to acknowledge publicly the fundamental role played by the communist left in the Italian resistance.
Reds, at the end of the day, were bad and that was that, even if they helped to liberate the country in 1945.
This year, however, the prime minister struck a new tone, one that may partly be motivated by his desire to win support and votes from quarters that were previously off-limits.
In the wake of his energetic and dynamic handling of the Abruzzo earthquake, the prime minister enjoys a 73 per cent approval rating with Italians.
Perhaps with his eye on Palazzo Quirinale (many believe that Berlusconi sees the office of president of Italy as his next stop), he has moved into the mode of unifying pacifier.
In a sense, the Abruzzo village of Onna offered him the perfect setting. Onna is where 40 of its 350 residents were killed in the earthquake earlier this month, and it is also the place where Nazi troops executed 17 people in a classic reprisal killing in 1944.
Wearing the scarf of the partisan Brigata Maiella around his neck, Berlusconi chose to make his April 25th “outing” at the commemoration ceremony in Onna, saying: “The resistance is one of the founding values of our nation. We, all free Italians, are on the side of those who fought for our freedom, our dignity and for the honour of our country.
“In the resistance movement, there were very different groups and people, but they were able to lay aside their differences, even the most profound ones, in order to fight together. Communists and Catholics, socialists and liberals, monarchists and azionisti, faced with a common enemy were able to write a great page of our history.”
Fine and noble words, yet, as is often the case where Berlusconi is concerned, not everyone was convinced.
Dario Franceschini, leader of the opposition Democratic Party (PD) and the man who publicly called on Berlusconi to celebrate Liberation Day, suggested that “we ought to have heard these words years ago”.
Franceschini also called on the prime minister to translate his words into action by blocking a controversial Bill, currently stuck in parliament.
The Bill would effectively award the same recognition (and pension rights) to those who fought with the resistance as to those repubblichini who fought with Mussolini’s Salò regime.
If Berlusconi means what he says about the resistance, then he should withdraw that Bill, Franceschini argues.
No sooner said than done.
Claiming that he was unaware of the legislation in question, the prime minister last weekend announced that it would be withdrawn.
While there were those on the right, such as Alessandra Mussolini, daughter of Il Duce, who objected, the prime minister’s words on April 25th and his decision on the war pensions legislation might just mark the beginning of a new era in “politics-according-to- Berlusconi”.
Is the businessman-tycoon- party leader serious about becoming a statesman?