Sanremo, the city of flowers and the festival that has launched ''global successes that celebrate life, happiness and love'', hosts the speech of the Ukrainian president
Volodymyr Zelensky
on the final evening of Saturday 11 February and controversy ensues.
"We hope that Sanremo will remain the Italian song festival and nothing else", says the minister of Infrastructure and Transport,
Matteo Salvini
, who adds: "They will have made their assessments, what I hope is that the war will end as soon as possible and that the stage of the city of flowers remains reserved for music".
Action leader Carlo Calenda
is also against Zelensky's video message
.
"There is little doubt about our line of support for Ukraine. However, I consider it a mistake to combine a musical event with a message from the President of a country at war," Calenda tweeted.
Different position that of the mayor of Florence
Dario Nardella
: "I don't think Zelensky's invitation to San Remo "is linked to the fact that San Remo now seems to support the sending of Leopard 2s from Germany, instead inviting him is a gesture, at least that's how I read it, of attention and solidarity to the Ukrainian people", said the exponent of the Democratic Party to "L'Aria che tira" on La7.
According to Nardella "to say that Sanremo must be divorced, separate from what is happening in the world and in Italy means not knowing Sanremo: there has always been talk of political issues, from the mafia to violence against women, to white deaths".
Furthermore, he added, "this is the first Sanremo that falls during the period of the war in Ukraine, which entered our homes, we talk about it at the table in the family, we talk about it with work colleagues, it is inevitable that it will also enter San Remo".
Quite skeptical
Giuseppe Conte
.
"I was very pleased when President Fico took the initiative to invite President Zelenski to confront the Italian Parliament to express his reasons and those of his people to the Italians. Instead, I frankly do not think it is so necessary that President Zelenski both in a light context like that of Sanremo", said the president of the M5s.
Conte said this at the end of the discussion on presidentialism with the Minister for Reforms, Elisabetta Casellati.
Bruno Vespa
says astonished .
"Frankly, I don't understand all this fuss about a brief speech by Zelensky at the Sanremo Festival," said Bruno, answering a question from ANSA.
The conductor, after having interviewed Zelensky, had given Domenica In the announcement of his presence via video link.
"High personalities of international politics took part in the Festival and all social issues were dealt with, even thorny and controversial ones - he underlined again - Zelensky was a guest at the Cannes and Venice festivals, as well as at the Golden Globes, and I am sorry for this malice against a man who is fighting with extraordinary courage to save the freedom of his people from a very heavy aggression".
Yesterday a large group of intellectuals mobilized and, waiting to take to the streets in Sanremo on Saturday the 11th, signed a protest manifesto.
''We learned with disbelief that Zelensky, head of state of one of the two countries fighting the bloody war in Donbass, will intervene.
A terrible war'', wrote in the document signed by Franco Cardini to
Carlo Freccero
, by Joseph Halevi to
Moni Ovadia
, by Paolo Cappellini to
Alessandro Di Battista
.
A war, they still write, ''fomented by irresponsible shipments of arms and unmentionable economic and geostrategic interests'', ''which has complex reasons, including the fact that NATO has gone to "bark at Russia's borders" (using the words of Pope Francis)'' and that in their opinion ''as Italians we have the constitutional duty to "repudiate"''.
And they add: ''Italy not only sends arms (and increases the military budget in a very difficult economic phase for the majority of Italians), but lets NATO and the United States use its territory as they please, in the absence of any form of governmental, parliamentary and popular control.
Due to this uncritical and supine position, Italy has given up carrying out the
As intellectuals, they add ''we have a duty to understand what is happening behind the scenes, and therefore we make ourselves available to speak to the Italian people, who to this end we invite to mobilize on Saturday 11 February in Sanremo, to participate in a large popular assembly of square.
Italy must exit the war immediately by interrupting all direct or indirect aid to one of the parties to the conflict.
Italy cannot resign itself to remaining a depot of deadly nuclear devices under American control, nor a place of war laboratories and research centres.
It is necessary to free our territory from this presence''.
''My generation - Carlo Freccero explained to ANSA - grew up with the taboo of nuclear power.
Today Zelensky presents the war to us with the lightness of a musical between songs and costumes.
Regardless of how we think, we need to regain a sense of reality and danger.
We are not in a movie.
There are and there will be real deaths and real victims.
The society of the show had never gone that far.
This is why I signed the document '', he concludes.
Among the signatories also the columnist and former 5 Star Alessandro Di Battista who judges the participation of the Ukrainian president in the final evening of the Sanremo festival as a "ridiculous antics". The reporter signed the petition shared by a group of intellectuals in which criticizes the decision to invite Zelensky to the singing show but, speaking with ANSA,
he specifies that he does not intend to participate in the protest in the square called in Sanremo for 11 February: "I support the petition but I will not participate in the demonstration".
Rather, he says, "if we establish that we start making a singing demonstration a place for debating political issues, then we also talk about what is happening in Palestine."