Catholic Leftist Actually Squelch Corruption in Sicily

canada goose outlet paypal Rosario Crocetta, flanked by bodyguards, in Sicily. If you are speaking to him, as an emissary from Turin named Antonio Saitta was on the day I first met Crocetta, he often picks up one of the phones in midconversation, without apology, and urgently begins reading text messages. canada goose outlet paypal

canada goose outlet uk It was spring, and we sat in Crocetta’s office in the Palazzo dei Normanni, built by the first Norman king of Sicily in the 12th century and later home to a ruler of the Holy Roman Empire, Spanish viceroys and a Bourbon king. Since 1947, it has been the seat of the Regional Assembly, the governing body of Sicily, whose current president is Crocetta, a 62 year old gay Catholic leftist with a penchant for romanticism and poetry, who is unlike any president the region has ever seen. canada goose outlet uk

canada goose outlet usa Normally in Italy, it is the politicians from the impoverished south who go north with hat in hand, but Saitta had www.beachcottage.ca flown to Palermo to try to convince Crocetta to abandon his plan to abolish Sicily’s provincial governments a layer of bureaucracy in Italy that exists between the regional and municipal levels, which Crocetta was arguing was a source of waste and mismanagement. As president of the Union of Italian Provinces, Saitta was of course invested in the preservation of Sicily’s nine provinces, and he was working hard to keep Crocetta’s attention and convince him that the new model he was proposing could not work. After several minutes, Crocetta tired of following the man’s argument. The real problem, he wanted Saitta to understand, was of an entirely different nature. “There is a revolution at our gates,” Crocetta said, “and if we don’t change everything really change the people canada goose uk shop will invade the government buildings. They’ll come in here to toss Canada Goose Online us out the window. And you know what?” he paused and looked at each of the people in the room. “I’ll throw myself out along with them, because they’re right.” canada goose outlet usa

canada goose outlet store calgary In the eight days I spent with Crocetta, not one passed without some group protesting outside the Palazzo dei Normanni or the nearby Palazzo d’Orleans, where the presidential offices are. Some of the protesters were maintenance workers (many of them former convicts), who work for the city of Palermo, which no longer has the money to pay them. Then there were representatives of Sicily’s 26,000 forest rangers, also now a target of the president’s cuts, and large groups of workers canadian goose jacket from Sicily’s trade schools, which employ about 8,000 people in the region, nearly half of all trade school employees in the entire country. Many of these schools are created only to get a piece of the public payroll, and Crocetta had made clear that their days were numbered. canada goose outlet store calgary

canada goose outlet in chicago The financial crisis has been especially brutal in Sicily which has been referred to as the “Greece of Italy” a place where the debt has spiraled so far out of control that canada goose black friday sale many fear it will bring the rest of Italy down with it. Even by Italian standards, Sicily has long been extreme in its waste and corruption. The government spent lavishly on companies and projects that had little or no purpose other than to guarantee votes and keep political parties in power. Directly or indirectly, the regional government that Crocetta oversees employs about 50,000 people, whose salaries total more than a billion euros a year. Past presidents were able to avoid the day of reckoning, but now the money has all but dried up. And according to buy canada goose jacket a study by the European Commission, among 262 European regions examined, Sicily is 235th in terms of competitiveness. canada goose outlet in chicago

canada goose outlet store quebec Days after he took office last December having been elected on the ballot of the political canada goose clearance movement he cheap canada goose uk co founded, the Megaphone Crocetta fired his predecessor’s 21 press officers. He then took aim at about 250 of the trade schools after proving that some were operated by the chauffeurs of regional politicians. When he greeted me for the first time, he proudly announced that he had discovered even more waste: “The region looks after about 800 exotic birds,” he said, “spending astronomical sums every year as much as 500,000 euros. It’s time to stop!” canada goose outlet store quebec

canada goose outlet london The birds were kept in the delightful park behind the Palazzo d’Orleans, and among them were members of endangered species like the Egyptian vulture. Crocetta decided to revoke the contract with the canada goose uk black friday company that maintained the park and to instead use researchers from local zoological institutions to look after the animals. Naturally, the decision sparked yet another protest, this time from the man who was the caretaker and the heir to the canada goose uk outlet family that had managed the park for decades. The birds belonged to him, he claimed, although many of them are simply descendants of the original flocks brought to the park in the 1950s. canada goose outlet london

canada goose victoria parka outlet “They will be fine,” Crocetta said of the birds as he Canada Goose Outlet hurried through the corridor, past paintings depicting scenes of Greek mythology. He was trailed by a clutch of Canada Goose Jackets reporters accustomed to hearing him cite the Sufi mystic Rumi in response to questions about sanitation, or Bertolt Brecht, when asked about public health. “The cockatoos,” Crocetta announced to the group, “will live like royalty.” canada goose victoria parka outlet

canada goose outlet belgium Crocetta’s predecessor is currently being prosecuted on charges of ties to organized crime. The one before him is serving time in jail. Another one, Piersanti Mattarella, was killed by the Mafia in 1980. “Either dead or in jail,” Crocetta told me. “I don’t know yet how my story will end.” canada goose outlet belgium

canada goose outlet trillium parka black The threats against him are serious enough that he travels with an escort of six armed men and every outing involves a caravan of armored cars. In January, Giuseppe Di Giovanna, president of Palermo’s manufacturers’ association, received a warning in the mail: “Mind your own business otherwise you will end up like that faggot Crocetta: slaughtered like a pig.” To canada goose factory sale this day, the threats persist, coming in the form of letters or phone calls or messages posted to Crocetta’s Facebook page saying that he will be killed. canada goose outlet trillium parka black

canada goose outlet black friday Last spring, the city’s deputy prosecutor received a letter that included the line, “We cannot be governed by clowns and fags.” According to some interpretations, “clown” referred to Beppe Grillo, the comedian whose political party, the Five Star Movement, has become the third strongest political force in Italy. And the “fag” is Crocetta, who in trying to build a coalition with Grillo’s group (the “Grillini,” as they are called), was thought to be creating a “Sicilian model” that could be exported to canada goose the rest of the country. canada goose outlet black friday

canada goose outlet legit For this and other reasons, Canada Goose Parka Crocetta has become popular far beyond his own region, regularly invited to appear on prime time talk shows, a voice so different that it cannot be ignored. canada goose outlet legit

canada goose jacket outlet Every night Crocetta leaves Palermo and travels to spend the night in the seaside town Castel di Tusa, an hour away. He goes there, he says, because he likes to hear the sound of the waves. But it’s also a survival strategy. He ventures out as little as possible, and when he is not in his office in either the Palazzo dei Normanni or the Palazzo d’Orleans, he is surrounded by a small circle of confidants and bodyguards. “Before you shake hands with somebody in Sicily, you have to ask for his criminal clearance certificate,” he jokes. canada goose jacket outlet

canada goose outlet miami In Tusa, his center of operations is a hotel called the Atelier sul Mare. At the entrance to the hotel is a two story gold column in the shape of the goddess Nike; above the concierge’s window is the motto “devotion to beauty.” Twenty of the hotel’s rooms were decorated by artists or other notables. The Water Carriers’ Room, uk canada goose outlet where I slept, is a work by Danielle Mitterrand, widow of the former French president. Crocetta used to sleep in the Room of the Forbidden Sea, which has six overhead screens all showing the same video clip of Canada Goose sale a wave breaking on a shore. He has also stayed in the Room of the Prophet, which is dedicated to the Italian filmmaker and poet Pier Paolo Pasolini. In that room, the walls and ceiling are made of straw and mud to imitate a house in Yemen, where Pasolini shot many of his films, and beneath the bed is sand from the beach near Rome where he was killed. Inscribed in Arabic is the famous refrain from his 1974 denunciation of corruption: “I know. But I have no evidence.” Instead of a bathroom shower, there is a system of pipes that spray strong jets of water everywhere (“It tends to flood the room,” the guide who gave me a tour said), what the brochure describes as “a great purifying bath where each of us is washed and spun like the car that ran canada goose coats on sale over Pasolini and killed him.” canada goose outlet miami

canada goose factory outlet toronto location Crocetta, too, is designing a room. “There will be no separation between it and the sea,” he tells me. canada goose clearance sale “And when you press a button, the bed will come down from a golden dome modeled on the Palatine Chapel in the Palazzo dei Normanni. There will be built canada goose store in banquettes covered with golden mosaics, like the ones in Monreale, to relax on during the day, alone or with someone else. The bathroom will have a waterfall gushing from the wall. It will be Arab inspired, and I’d really like to include verses by the Syrian poet Adonis, one of the great contemporary poets of love.” canada goose factory outlet toronto location

canada goose jacket uk He relocated to a nearby apartment for the summer, to avoid tourists and for security reasons, but he maintains a room in the Atelier that has his initials on the door in rhinestones. When I visited, there were piles of clothes on every surface, a table full of creams and a small television on which, in the morning, he watched the Disney Junior channel (he is fond of Peppa Pig, a cartoon about a family of pigs and their animal friends). canada goose jacket uk

canada goose outlet ontario The Atelier sul Mare has become a kind of alternative capital of Sicily. Crocetta often convenes executive committee meetings in the Hall of the Double Dream, where two columns seem to plunge into the wall and shatter it. By day, crowds of people arrive to meet with him, but in the evening only his intimates remain. They call the hotel a “convent,” and when they are in good spirits, they refer to one another as “Sister” or “Abbess.” When I told Crocetta that I felt as if I had dropped into the movie “Birdcage,” but with bodyguards placed outside the doors, he replied, “Unfortunately, it’s not Miami out there, but Sicily.” After a moment he added: “I don’t care. This is how I am. And anyhow I prefer the films of Almodvar.” canada goose outlet ontario

canada goose jacket outlet store His extended family at the hotel includes a septuagenarian, who cheap Canada Goose prepares meals at all hours (dinners often start after midnight); Giuseppe Comandatore, his personal assistant, who keeps Crocetta’s suitcase ready and is always on the lookout for special ingredients for the next meal; and Michela Stancheris, a former assistant who is now in charge of tourism for the region. (After my departure, a new man, Cheap canada goose outlet Moussa Ndoye, a Senegalese married to a Sicilian, was brought on as Crocetta’s personal secretary. “Again, I’m sending a strong message of progress in a country where Ccile Kyenge” Italy’s first black government minister “was outrageously referred to as an ‘orangutan,’ ” Crocetta said.) canada goose jacket outlet store

canada goose factory outlet And then there is Antonio Presti, proprietor of the Atelier, who many Sicilians believe is Crocetta’s partner. On the night I arrived, however, Presti told me that he has been with another man for 12 years. Presti has also had his own long struggle against the Mafia. His father owned a cement factory, and Presti learned after his death in 1983 that he had been paying bribes to the Mafia in order to conduct business. Presti knew that if he took over the factory, he would have to do the same, but he was buy canada goose jacket cheap unwilling to pay the bribes his father had paid. “I realized I only had three options: to be killed, kill myself or give up. I chose beauty.” Instead of paying for protection, he invested in works of art, creating an outdoor museum in Tusa. In 1992, a bomb went off in Presti’s hotel, and another in the cement factory. “I got threatening letters,” Presti said. “No one on the street spoke to me.” He met Crocetta two decades ago. “This is the story of a generation that’s now 60 years old,” Presti said. He was troubled by the way that power, whether by the Mafia or by the “anti Mafia,” was wielded in Sicily and the way that counterculture figures became part of the establishment. “It bothers me a little bit now,” Presti said, “because Rosario embodies the power that I have fought for years. I am interested in Rosario my friend, not the politician.” (Not long after I visited, Crocetta offered him a job in his administration, as a minister of culture, and Presti refused.) canada goose factory outlet

canada goose outlet england The following night, when I told Crocetta what Presti said, he shook his head in disagreement. “It is not true that politics has nothing to do with the soul,” he said. “Pope Paul VI said that it is the highest form of charity. But then the Gospel also has the passage that says, ‘I send you forth as sheep in the midst of wolves: be ye therefore wise as serpents.’ ” canada goose outlet england

canada goose outlet jackets It was after midnight and everyone had gone to bed, leaving us alone at a table that had a plate of sliced oranges sprinkled with cinnamon and a bowl of raw fennel bulbs that Crocetta chewed whole. When I asked him whom he considered his enemies to be, he said, “The old leopards who think that because I want to change everything, nothing will change, who think I’m just a temporary phenomenon and that all they need to do is wait me out.” canada goose outlet jackets

canada goose outlet price He pulled out a plastic supermarket bag from the black backpack that he carries everywhere and plucked out a pill for his back pain. “It’s wrong to think that Sicily is any different from Rome,” he said. “You find useless institutions there, too, public utilities created only as a favor for a friend and not because it serves the community. Sicily always turns into a metaphor, because here everything is exaggerated.” In Sicily, he explained, the Mafia has magnified the same corruption that exists everywhere, and has perfected it. uk canada goose “The Mafiosi no longer even need to fire a single bullet,” he said, “because they are inside the machine, doing legal business with illegal methods.” canada goose outlet price

canada goose outlet orlando From 2003 to 2009, Crocetta was the mayor of Gela, a small city 115 miles south of Palermo where Aeschylus died canada goose coats and that remained a seaside resort until the 1950s, when oil was found underground and just off the coast. In 1963, the energy company Eni built its first Italian refinery there, a plant that now dominates the city with its towers. The refinery brought money and a new social stratum, an industrial underclass, where once there had been only farmers and fishermen. The population quickly increased by 50 percent, to 85,000 inhabitants, without any strategic plan. canada goose outlet orlando

canada goose jacket outlet uk I rode through one of these neighborhoods with Elisa Nuara, who was the deputy mayor of Gela under Crocetta and is now a prominent lawyer. Canada Goose Coats On Sale “The illegal houses have their pillars left up and protruding,” Nuara said, pointing out that many buildings lack roofs. “They are ready for the construction of more floors in case another child is born.” In 1983, Nuara told me, when the mayor tried to put an end to such construction, the city was set aflame and thousands of people took to the streets, occupying the town hall, burning Canada Goose online the archives that detailed the unlawful building and seizing the mayor, forcing him to read a public speech of solidarity with the protesters. canada goose jacket outlet uk

canada goose outlet vancouver Crocetta grew up near the refinery in Gela. His father was a firefighter until government cuts forced him to take odd jobs before finding a position as an aqueduct worker. The children were supported for a number of years by their mother, who sewed clothes for the city’s wealthy and, according to Crocetta, forced him to go to school wearing a smock made from his grandmother’s old dress. canada goose outlet vancouver

canada goose outlet store toronto He was the youngest of four brothers. When he was 23, he got a job working for Eni, where he later became a computer technician, and eventually left Gela to work in other parts of Italy and for three years in Bahrain. When he returned, at 39, he founded a center for at risk children canada goose outlet store toronto.

Deja un comentario

Tu dirección de correo electrónico no será publicada. Los campos necesarios están marcados *

Puedes usar las siguientes etiquetas y atributos HTML: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

Visita nuestros videos
Could not parse XML from YouTube
Link to my Facebook Page
Link to my Flickr Page
Recomienda esta página!
Link to my Pinterest Page
Link to my Reddit Page
Link to my Rss Page
Link to my Twitter Page
Link to my Youtube Page
Localízanos