Emhoo Blog

Here is a story drawn from the book entitled "Morti Bianche" (White Deaths), written by Samanta Di Persio and made available free of charge on this blog.
"The accident involving Antonino Mingolla occurred on 18 April 2006. My husband was working for a company called Cmt, a firm that had been awarded the maintenance contract for the Ilva plants. Due to his many years of experience in the field, he was appointed as deputy site foreman. On that fateful day, he and his team were scheduled to replace a valve on a certain pipeline that removed the gases produced by the blast furnaces. This task required that the workers wear masks connected to air tanks located on the ground. Prior to the commencement of the maintenance operations, Ilva was required to make the area safe, in other words, shut off the gas supply and flush the pipeline with nitrogen in order to remove any remaining traces of the gas. The flushing occurs through a number of flues. The valves were then to be shut by Ilva employees prior to handing over to the outside company for them to begin with the necessary work. In order to ensure the “safety” of the operations, the company normally handed out the masks they kept on hand, which were fitted with gas detectors, but apparently, on tat day none of these detectors registered the presence of any gas.
The pipes on which the people were working are enormous. They are three metres in diameter and are suspended some twenty metres above ground level. There were walkways located adjacent to this pipeline. On the one side was the entrance with the staircase leading up, serving both as access way and escape route. In the spot where my husband was working, there was a two-metre by four-metre walkway, fenced off by a handrail. Each time Antonino needed to move around, communicate with anyone at the other end of the working area or simply move away in order to keep an eye on the workers, or if he perhaps felt unwell, he was obliged to clamber over a three-metre pipe.
This was an untenable situation and one that was anything but safe. When a company puts a job out on tender, they should oversee the work in order to ensure compliance with the safety regulations, even as regards temporary operations. Are we honestly expected to believe that neither Ilva nor Cmt committed any safety violations?
Notwithstanding the fact that the conditions were not up to the required standards, my husband and his team nevertheless began with the maintenance procedure. If the truth were told, this was the way it had always been. They started disconnecting the pipes to insert the blank flanges that run on rails, in order to prevent any gas from escaping while the valve was being worked on.
Already early on during the day, they had encountered certain problems with the insertion of the blank flanges. At around 10 o’clock, one of Antonino’s colleagues began to feel ill due to the emission of toxic gaseous substances into the air.
When I spoke to him, he told me that he had changed the gas tank. The procedure for changing the tank was the same as it had always been previously and involved the workers moving back to a safe zone. That morning, instead, when he put the mask back on, he began to feel ill as a result of dizziness and nausea. What I think is that there were high levels of carbon monoxide in the air, which also landed on Antonino’s mask and he eventually died at four in the afternoon. His shift was due to end at 15h00. He stayed on for an extra hour due to his sense of duty and because he wanted to see the maintenance job through to its conclusion.
Only the court case will be able to establish the precise dynamics of the accident with any kind of certainty. For the time being, there is only a lot of passing the buck.
Antonino and I were the same age; we were both 46 years old at the time of the accident. We had two adolescent children who are now 15 and 16 years of age respectively. We had made a joint decision that he would go out to work while I would stay at home and raise our children. I try to provide the children with everything they may need so as to ensure that they can live in a carefree manner and, I must say, they have been extremely understanding. I feel honour bound to carry on fighting, together with the other families that have been left all alone, both by the trades union and the politicians. The only trade union that has given us any kind of support at all is the organised SLAI COBAS trade union of Taranto, who advised us to set up the “12th July Association”. Ilva has never approached us, not even as regards the conciliation attempt set up by my attorney.
Antonino was afraid because there had been far too many accidents of late. For example, I remember on of the stories he told me. On one occasion, a worker standing next to my husband fell off the scaffolding, under which ran the conveyor belts. They asked that the conveyor belts be stopped so that the man’s body could be recovered, but Ilva could not halt their production. From the year 2000, through to 2007, 16 men lost their lives in that place. That place is and always will be Dante’s Inferno, so it is appropriate to quote the phrase “abandon hope all ye that enter here”. It was only thanks to a bit of fear and irony that my husband was able to continue going to work. I am concerned about the fact that around 1,300 people die every year due to their work, that too many of these have no voice and are not ever mentioned. We are talking about an average of 3.5 deaths every day. My prayer is that no more bodies be separated and broken because these are human beings and should remain intact. What I wish for is that the hope for justice never dies, because it is difficult to face court cases where, against a colossus such as Ilva, I feel somewhat like an insignificant little ant. I cannot believe that the statute of limitations on these cases actually expires after just seven years.
During this period, hearings may be postponed for no reason and the delays increase without any valid reason, for example, when certain witnesses fail to show up. There is no respect or protection, not even after tragedy for which my husband bore no blame. There are 13,500 people currently working for Ilva, and another 8,000 currently working for associated companies. There is no other option but for them to join the other families involved in the Associazione 12 giugno and the many other associations that would like to join forces, so that we can give each other strength and to travel throughout Italy to tell the story to anyone who may wish to fight at our side."
Samanta Di Persio, from the book entitled "Morti Bianche".

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Army in the city
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Ignazio La Russa has deployed the army. Three thousand soldiers in the cities of Italy. If before this, the law enforcers always went around in twos, now they go around in fours. Two soldiers and two carabinieri or police. The mixed teams are already at work. In Milan, where Piazza del Duomo is controlled not unlike Kabul (there’s even the dog and his controller), in the first two days there have been three actions by the army, all decisive.
- First intervention: a man uses his elbow to smash a the glass of a fire alarm in the metro. “A patrol of police and military from the army arrived rapidly on the spot(*)". The guilty one was identified and denounced.
- Second intervention: two young people on a scooter didn’t stop when told to do so by a police car “The scooter was blocked by carabinieri and military in a mixed patrol at the “delle Cave” park. The chase started in via Forze Armate (where else? [editor]) and ended when the scooter entered the green space. Once inside the park, however the two youngsters got a flat rear tyre and while they were pushing the scooter towards the exit they were blocked and identified by the new mixed patrols of carabinieri and military (*).”
- Third intervention: a drunk was arguing with a shopkeeper “Military at work even in via Padova, where they are patrolling together with police officers. Yesterday they intervened to sort out an argument. But the intervention in this case was minimum. It was enough for the soldiers to turn up and bring back the calm(*)."
The deputy mayor “camerata” Riccardo De Corato was exultant: We have obtained the first important results, both in terms of deterrent and in terms of bringing back the serenity and the quiet life in problematic areas.”
The Police have always less money, they don’t have petrol for the police cars and overtime is not paid. This is why they bring out the army because the State has a ragged arse. And they make out that cuts in Police funding are increasing security. The Army is used like the strikebreakers of once upon a time.
At the Venice Film Festival the police won’t be there. The police officers have not yet received a euro for overtime in 2007 done during double shifts. If they are not paid they will not go to the Lido.
The Ministry instead of euros proposes “compensatory repose”. The 200 officers will probably be substituted by parachutists of the Brigata Paracadutisti Folgore. Cacciari has already said he is OK with that in the name of governability. One flew over the strikebreaker’s nest
(*) Corriere della Sera, 6 August 2008 Comments (No responses yet)

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In Italy, defamation pays. It is the backbone of disinformation. The stick to use against enemies and against friends who are too entrepreneurial. A club that has hit just about everyone. The mad Bossi who attacked the mafia guy of Arcore in the early 1990s. Fini, the young career man who wanted to do things on his own, with the new companion pilloried by "Striscia la notizia". The young man with beautiful hopes Azzurro Caltagirone, reduced to a smudge. For the enemies, and here you understand enemies to be those who have not allowed themselves to be “bought”, the ration is doubled, tripled, so basically, really abundant. Whoever is not for sale is dangerous. They cannot be blackmailed. And how can you trust a person who you cannot blackmail? In the times of bombs and the Corleonesi mafia, you had them explode into thin air. One strike and it’s done. But at that time, information was not completely under control. They were crude but inevitable mechanisms. The machine gun for Dalla Chiesa or the TNT imported for the military that was brought from the continent to via D'Amelio, are distant memories
These days, the motorways are useful for imposing the State “pizzo” by means of the Benetton concession. To destroy them when a judge is passing by, as happened at Capaci, creates economic damage.
The nutriment for defamation is (false) facts, (one-sided) opinions, adjectives to disqualify. Ms Forleo becomes psychologically unstable, and above all she cries. What guarantee is offered by a judge who cries? A weak and fragile woman. Whether she is right is not relevant. If she touches D'Alema she is to be transferred, far from Milan, to Cremona. De Magistris had put his finger in the sore of the exchange vote, of the European funds shared out with the local criminals and the parties. He was attacked for being active, accused of having violated the code. He was absolved of every accusation and anyway transferred to Naples. The politicians from Calabria under investigation have not been transferred. Calabria is full of clean swimming pools in the villas of power and full of turds floating on the beaches because of the purification plant that have never been made to function. With the accusations against me, you could fill an encyclopedia. The great thing is that they are all false.
The defamation of the adversary has even the aim of moving the attention from MY problems with the justice system, to YOUR (non-existent) problems with the justice system. From MY corruption to your (non-existent) abuses. From MY closeness with people convicted of mafia crimes to YOUR justicialist rages. The more they are lurid, the more the shit I throw on my adversaries, cleanses me.
The System is united. Repubblica and Emilio Fede are not different. Belpietro and Padellaro are Siamese twins separated at birth and united in the defense of the master.
We cannot go ahead like this. Hard and soft defamation has to be fought. It is by now a virus that infects the mind of the Country. People believe what is decided by Berlusconi and De Benedetti and the powers connected to htem. People are intoxicated. Anyone who puts themselves forward to change the System is attacked by the media with the absolute certainty of remaining unpunished. The most they risk is a fine. Nothing to destroy a reputation.
From today there’s an active area of the blog called "Sputtaniamoli" {Let’s discredit them}.
Insert the false articles, the links and the information about the journalist who signed them. I will make it a fixed column in the blog.
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Each year the Italians pay taxes even to give about 13 billion euro to the European Community. This money finishes up in a common fund. About 8 or 9 billion returns to Italy. That’s called help from the European Community, but it’s our money. That escapes from any control by the government. The one signing for the destination of the funds is an unknown official in Brussels. The billions destined for works that are usually not brought to fruition or are useless or not even spent (but pocketed). The euros returning finish up on the whole in Campania, in Calabria, in Sicily. But the people of Campania, of Calabria, or of Sicily don’t see the positive effects. This flow of uncontrolled money feeds criminality, the undergrowth of politics, the exchange votes. And all in the light of day, but it’s all hidden. Like the best traditions of our country. Once upon a time, there was the “Cassa del Mezzogiorno”, today there is the “Cassa di Bruxelles” {Brussels Cash}. The blog, as soon as it can, will give an account of the spending and will publish it. The Italians need to know where their taxes go, who spends the money and what it’s used for. The Internet has exactly this function.

”I’m an American, from Apulia. I’m in advertising and I’m outraged. That’s why I will never participate any more in the Italian public competitions for communications.
These are the facts: on 14 December 2007, the Region of Apulia published a competition announcement for the communication and promotion of its territory in Italy and in the world. The money offered is not a mean amount. 7 million euro! And as it is money from the European Community, it has all to be spent, as is very clear in the competition announcement, in the two years 2007 to 2008.
And already here, I who am American, perhaps naïve and perhaps an idealist, identify the first anomaly. Where I live, if someone receives public financing and they say that he has to spend it in a certain way, he does it. It would be as if my doctor tells me that in order to get better from my illness I have to take a certain medicine for two years, and I decide to take the medicine only in the second year but two at a time.
I have an advertising agency in New York and one in Italy and lots of agencies belonging to our group in the main countries of Europe. I am an American citizen and I’m an Italian resident. My family has its origins in Apulia. I know, respect and love Apulia. How could I not have participated in this tender? So, together with my partners and with the agencies of our international system, we set to work: strategies, creativity, numbers, ideas and documents. So much paper, hundreds of sheets, millions of sheets!
On 11 February 2008 the tender period closed and 7 companies apart from us, present their proposals. I’m thinking, may the best one win. And here is the second anomaly. I discover that in the competition there are not just advertising and communications agencies, but also groups of publishers and TV networks from Apulia. Strange, isn’t it? Where I come from, communications are done by communications agencies. It’s as though to promote the sale of my ice creams in the bars of the whole world, I ask the bar under my apartment to create the campaign. But let’s get to the third anomaly. It’s February. Summer is getting closer and the proposals sleep in the drawers of the Region, under a warm layer of dust. The months slip by and my astonishment grows. How is it possible, I ask from New York to my colleagues in Italy. They lost last season, they wouldn’t want to lose this one as well? Yes. They want to lose this one too.
Today, 20 July 2008, the contract to promote Apulia in the two years 2007 – 2008 has not yet been assigned. After the opening of the final envelopes, the classification causes some perplexity and strange shadows hover over the certainty of its assigning. And guess who is in top position? “The bar under my apartment” To say, without giving offence, the local company.
I don’t know whether it will be made official the allocation of the budget, but I know that to spend 7 million euro in TV advertising, press releases, radio advertising, flyers and brochures, all in a handful of weeks at the end of the year is an offence to common sense. And for what then? To attract to Apulia skiers and those in all the world who love winter sports?
Here are my conclusions: I participated knowing that I could win. But also putting into the calculations that I could lose. We have not lost. It’s worse. We were excluded for a vice of form. We were about to appeal because our lawyer said that the reasons for our exclusion do not exist. I have stopped everything and I have decided to write this letter. I am not interested in being an accomplice in this waste of money. I am interested in denouncing it. I am doing it as an outraged American publicist, as a proud Italian resident, as an injured person from Apulia. And I am asking why does no one make his voice heard? Does the European Community have nothing to say when it sees how its money is used? And does the Italian association of advertisers not feel the need to defend their professionalism? I know that when I open the American newspapers I will see advertising about other regions of Italy. And I also know that the next time I land at Fiumicino, Rome’s airport I will see massive advertisement for Sicily, Tuscany etc. And I will laugh when I arrive at Bari Palese and as always, there will be big posters promoting tourism in Apulia. As usual the money will be well spent! OK. It’s said and it’s done. I accept the responsibility for my gesture. And I send good wishes to the TV networks and to the publishing houses who united together in a temporary association of companies, will see themselves being allocated the contract. Waiting for them, there are a handful of weeks of hard work! To produce the campaign and to broadcast it on their networks. So at least the people of Apulia next year will choose to go on holiday in Apulia.” Paul Cappelli
Founder and President The Ad Store International, New York Comments (No responses yet)

Security Telecom Italia. Tronchetti Provera, Tavaroli
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In May 2007, Intesa San Paolo, Mediobanca, Generali and Telefonica got rid of the unhappy Tronchetti and they bought the controlling package of Telecom for an exorbitant value. In July 2007, I wrote “Telecom shares are worth a bit more than 2 euro. The Piave line, the K2 of the analysts, is about to be breached. After that there’s the unknown. It’s nothing new. When Tronchetti demanded and got 2.9 euro per share, it was known to be an “ad personam” value. To get rid of him with a golden handshake. The industrial forecast for the share was between 1.5 and 1.7 euro.”
I was being an optimist.
Today Telecom shares are worth about 1.1 euro. K2 has been transformed into K1. The threshold of the euro is near. And after that?
If the shareholders cry (one or two have lost nearly everything). The bondholders are trembling. The Telecom debt, turned upside down in part onto those who own bonds, is 46 billion euro. Bernabè, the new CEO has denied there’ll be the sale of Telecom Italia to Telefonica, perhaps he would do it (or he would have to do it) willingly given the disastrous financial situation, but the government cannot allow itself to lose other Italian companies.
The decrease in value for the shareholders and for the System of Italy has been impressive under the Tronchetti/Buora management, allowed to go with millionaire golden handshakes, paid for years with salaries higher than the European companies in the sector.
Before the final crash, the Knock Out, it’s useful to ask a few questions:
- Who will compensate the Banca Intesa San Paolo, Mediobanca and General shareholders for having purchased Telecom shares at at least double their value? Everyone knew and they didn’t? The companies in the controlling group will have to devalue their shares by a few hundred million. Their patrimony will be worth less, their shares will be worth less. Who will pay for an out-of-market choice?
- The situation in which Bernabè found Telecom was (and is) dramatic. A plan to sack the staff is already underway, at least 10,000 (in relation to this, is Napoletone also included?) Telecom should take it out on the previous administrators, even for the vertical drop in Telecom’s image due to the wire-tapping. Will it happen?
- Telecom Italia cannot do it on its own. The white knight is called Telefonica. If there is a takeover bid, will it be the usual folk to gain? Only those who possess the controlling package, Benetton included, or even the small shareholders who represent the majority of the ownership? What will the Consob do?
Arriba Espana! Comments (No responses yet)

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Many people have written to me to say the signatures have been no use. That they will do what they want to anyway.
The signatures are useful to count us.
Many people say that the V-Days have been a "wham bam thank you ma'm".
The V-Days have been useful for us to see each other, to touch each other, to smile and to affirm our right to shout out that we are alive, we are still alive. They have not beaten us and they will never beat us.
Many people say that all this has served no useful purpose if Berlusconi is still there, if the P2 and the Mafia are in Parliament.
But they are the past, can’t you see them? They are living in fear, in special laws, in the army.
The future is beauty and they do not form a part. This is why they are sad. This is why we will win by taking them for a ride.
Jacofo Fo has sent me a poem for V3 day.

”We are winning
But this day will we do a Vaffanculo Day of laughter?
We are winning
Don’t let yourselves be bowled over by the TV News images!
We are unhinging the immobile mud from the frozen spirits.
We are making love more.
We are beating the dawn drums more.
We are thinking up colossal jokes.
Berlusconi’s new laws, Veltroni’s sadness
Don’t fall into the trap.
They are about to fall into the wide open mouth of the past
Like drops of rain
It will still last a bit longer but then we will say: do you remember the fear?

The oil is finished, we must change.
The information monopoly is finished
On the Web, you can’t forbid me to tell
It’s like when they invented the telephone.
After a bit they didn’t use the carrier pigeons.
The world changes.
Just think once upon a time sex didn’t exist, just single cell asexual organisms
They multiplied by parthogenesis, that is they split in half.
And it was not a pleasant experience.

Now we are extremely sexual pluri-cell organisms, we can make love and sing.
But it has to be clear there’s need for a bit of a push to make the inexorable wheel of History keep turning.
We have to launch a total offensive, it’s our historical task as progressives.
We do nothing else: we start general mobilizations one after the other, every time we have the breath to do it. We like it like that. You get to know loads of interesting people and at times you also get satisfaction.
And today the total offensive on today’s agenda is to make more love. A tiny bit of effort, we can even get better.
Write a poem for the person you love.
Tell a friend you are fond of them.
Draw a flower on the wall in front of their house so every time they go out they’ll remember that you love them.
Do something extraordinary, reckless
Kiss her on the lips as though it were the first time
It’s enough to put behind you the line of the past.
And to live in that instant just before the first time that we kissed. And to remember that for an instant, while the mouths are getting closer you picked up the perfume that was rising from her neck.
Let your lips part, your tongue is waiting for a taste that you have never experienced.
A flavour that contains the sound of rice leaves that unfurl in the humidity of the water.
…. "
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foto di edoardo.baraldi

A three-act comedy:
Topo Gigio Veltroni to the rescue
Main actors: Antonio Di Pietro, known as Kryptonite, Walter Veltroni, known as Topo Gigio and the shadow Government of the Pdwithoutanel.
Off-screen prompt (inaudible): Berlusconi, known as the Psychodwarf
Act One:
Antonio Di Pietro begins gathering signatures for a referendum calling for the abolition of the Alfano Draft Bill. This is an unconstitutional Law that makes four of this Country's citizens more equal than all the rest. Their names, in alphabetical order, are as follows: Berlusconi, Fini, Napolitano, Schifani. One of these has been involved in court cases for the past fifteen years. The other three have not been accused of anything, but they nevertheless went along for the ride. Kryptonite Di Pietro is asking for help from his allies in the Pdwithoutanel in order to gather 500,000 signatures by September 2008 so as to be able to hold the referendum during the spring of 2009.
Act Two:
Topo Gigio Veltroni convenes a meeting of the shadow Government on 31 July in order to discuss the referendum. Topo Gigio quotes Oscar Luigi Scalfaro: “Depending on the outcome, a referendum will always results in greater visibility for the party promoting it. However, should it be a failure, even as a result of the failure to reach a quorum, the entire opposition would land up looking bad”. Addressing his shadow Government, Topo Gigio highlights “the very wise words uttered by Scalfaro”. This is a quantum leap in terms of Veltroni’s terminology. He has moved on from the use of multiple adjectives, such as his unforgettable “intellectual, rational, reformist camp”, and on to the use of superlatives. Topo Gigio will not agree to a referendum because “it could fail”. This is his favourite strategy, which he once again adopted during the last elections. Don’t take part in order not to lose. Veltroni explained to the shadow Government that: “there are other priorities, such as the social welfare crisis, salaries and the Country’s growth”. Finally he concluded in truly statesmanlike fashion, but also as a refined diplomat and filmmaker that: “We don’t want to focus the main attention back on the Berlusconian controversy”. The applause from the senior members of the PDwithoutanel moved him. Follini is overcome and sighs: “You are right and you are wise, well done Veltroni…”. Rosy Bindi added that: “Notwithstanding the fact that the PDL is undoubtedly busy raping the Constitution, the path chosen by Di Pietro is wrong”.
Act Three:
In the 2009 European elections Veltroni is rewarded by the voters for his “very wise”, but also “intellectual, rational and reformist” political line, with a new Walterloo. The PDwithoutanel splits in two out of joy. Veltroni steps down as party secretary of the PDwithoutanel, reiterating a previous statement he made on 19 February 2008: “You will never hear me launching any sort of attack against him (Berlusconi - Ed). The one involving him is a joyous controversy, but that’s okay. The Italians tired of all the improprieties, only to land up with a Country that is immobile”.

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”No dal Molin” – response to the Cabinet’s decision

Vicenza does not want the new Dal Molin military base. The people of Vicenza are set to confirm as much in the referendum scheduled for next autumn. In the meantime, they are protesting against the decision in favour of the base, as taken by the Cabinet and enduring “thinning-out” attacks, in the sense that they are being truncheoned, in the manner of the “ndo cojo cojo”, by the MPs.
Certainly, the people of Vicenza should not take over the local railway station. They must find another way to make their point. Another way of explaining that the American occupation of Italy has been going on for the past 63 years. That the 90 atomic bombs made in the USA and now sitting at Ghedi Torre and Aviano are an offence to the collective civil conscience of our Country. That Vicenza is set to become the largest military base in the whole of Europe. And that, from this very base, the American bombers could take off on their killing missions.
Our Constitution specifically rejects war, so on what grounds does this Government simply go ahead and grant authorisation for Italy to act as America’s aircraft carrier, used today to bomb the Middle East and tomorrow, who knows who is next in turn? The Berlin wall may well have fallen, but now, twenty years on, the American Army is still here. How long must we wait for Italy to be free of all foreign armies, the hundredth anniversary of the end of the Second World War perhaps?
Maroni has the people of Vicenza truncheoned, simply because they don’t want their land to become a place of war. This has got to be the height of contradiction. The Lega, arch-enemy of globalisation, lays out the red carpet to welcome the armies from across the ocean. No to Coca Cola, but yes to atomic bombs. We are masters in our house, but with 90 nuclear bombs spread between Brescia and the Friuli Region. Masters of what? Collecting fingerprints from gypsy children? The Lega of the truncheon and of the Government (La Russa will bring along the cod-liver oil). Being strong with the weak and weak with the strong.
Government Commissioner Paolo Costa has arrived in Vicenza. In future, if the people of Vicenza dare to hold any peaceful demonstrations against the military base, the army will be sent in without delay. Already before the last elections I warned that Berlusconi would use the army against the population of this Country in order to govern, however, it won’t continue for very long. Stand up magnagatti (“Cat-eaters”, a nickname for the people of the Veneto Region). Say no to the “Dal Molin” military base.

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