«We are saved and move forward if we act together and not just one by one». There are Enrico Berlinguer's ideas and values in these words which summarize the impulses that have always animated his political action. They come to mind when reading “Opposition. The last battle of Enrico Berlinguer” written by the journalist Luca Telese (Solferino, 384 pages) in bookstores today.
40 years after his death, on 11 June 1984, four days after the dramatic rally in Padua, memories and new food for thought emerge.
«Berlinguer's last battle - explains Telese - has been forgotten and removed, yet it must be rediscovered because at that moment it addresses issues and emergencies that recur today. 40 years later, the same conditions occur as in the last months of Berlinguer's life. There was the economic crisis, inflation, war, energy crisis and even then Israel was attacking the Palestinians. Now we deal with the same ghosts."
What are the compasses that Berlinguer follows on that night which is very similar to our night?
«It puts the social question and the moral question at the center of the debate and of its political action, two very current compasses».
Let's start with the social question.
«In the strenuous battle against Bettino Craxi, he defends the employees affected by the Valentine's Day decree which blocks the escalator, the mechanism by which paychecks are adjusted to the rise of inflation. In Italy, after the referendum on the escalator, pay slips grew less than in the rest of Europe. And at the same time, purchasing power has decreased."
The moral question, the other north star.
It was relaunched in the interview with Eugenio Scalfari in 1981. Many in the party expressed criticism: Now who do we form alliances with? It makes us argue with the socialists . Berlinguer is talking about the country, he is not talking about a party. The parties have occupied the institutions, healthcare, companies, information. It sounds like an interview given today."
Close to the masses, but distant from the ruling group. Do you feel a sense of loneliness within the party?
«Yes, in the book I reconstruct the details of the last direction in which he clashed with a block of very important leaders, Giorgio Napolitano, Nilde Jotti, Giancarlo Pajetta, Giorgio Lama, who told him: this line may be right but where are we going to end up? Aldo Tortorella says that the PCI reformists ask him: but where does Enrico want to go? Newspapers and satire target him: he no longer understands society . However, the moral question and the social question take root in the country, a great harmony, a very strong connection is created between Berlinguer and his people. He also comes into contact with people who are very different from him. In the book I tell a fact that seems strange today. At his funeral, Federico Fellini, who had and would later have sympathies for the Republican Party, was part of the honor guard. But that day pays homage to the leader of the PCI."
All this created the basis for the overtaking of the DC in the European elections of June 1984 a few days after the death of the secretary of the Communist Party.
«Berlinguer has overtaken the DC. He remained on the death list because the lists could not be changed. Not only did he overtake the DC, but he was the most voted candidate in all of Europe with 715 thousand votes. Someone said: an emotional event after the heroic rally, the death and the funeral in Piazza San Giovanni. It is not so. At the demonstration on 24 March 1984 against the Valentine's Day decree there were a million people in Rome, in the streets with Berlinguer's PCI and the CGIL for the defense of pay slips, a battle that Enrico Berlinguer had convincingly led. It is a great catalyst of consensus and passion. Then he addresses the topic of peace and the battle against Euromissiles. In 1982 he reactivated the Assisi Peace March and quoted Saint Francis who had been able to challenge " reasonableness of war and the crusades and the distinction between just wars and unjust wars ".
Sardinia is always a safe haven.
«One of the men in his escort, Roberto Bertuzzi, talks about his last holiday in Stintino. The only time he regenerates. Upon arrival, after disembarking from the ferry, he is worried about his daughter Bianca who has to follow the procession of cars (Berlinguer's car and that of Digos) driving her A112. At a certain point, Bianca rear-ends the Digos car. And in Stintino, in the evening, Bertuzzi notices that Berlinguer is observing the police car and hears these words: "Thank goodness, there's no damage." In Sardinia he passes from an urban regime to Oloturia, his goiter. He likes the sea, he likes crossing the Strait of Bonifacio. And he welcomes, as Gavino Angius recalls in the book, the Sardinian leaders of the party who bring him pecorino and cannonau".
The video features interviews with Livia Turco, former communist leader and minister, and Mario Pani, former regional secretary of the PCI, who accompanied Enrico Berlinguer on his last trip to Sardinia.