The state funeral with a secular rite will begin at 11.30 in the Montecitorio Chamber to say farewell to President Emeritus Giorgio Napolitano, who died on Friday at the age of 98.
French President Emmanuel Macron and German Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier will also arrive to pay homage to the two-time Head of State. The ceremony will last an hour and a half.
As requested by the Napolitano family, the presidents of the Senate Ignazio la Russa and of the Chamber Lorenzo Fontana will speak. Then the former prime minister and former president of the Constitutional Court Giuliano Amato, the European commissioner Paolo Gentiloni, Gianni Letta and the former parliamentarian Anna Finocchiaro.
The words of Cardinal Gianfranco Ravasi will also be heard, to continue to weave the delicate thread between the experience of the secular president and the religious dimension. Presence which represents another step after the historic visit of Pope Francis on Sunday to the chapel of rest set up in the Senate.
The last farewell speeches will be reserved for the family, his son Giulio and his granddaughter Sofia. The Head of State Sergio Mattarella will arrive in Montecitorio a few minutes before the arrival of the coffin from Palazzo Madama which will be carried on shoulders to the funeral home of Montecitorio by eight soldiers from the joint force group. Among the authorities also expected on the benches are the Albanian president Edi Rama, the Duchess of Edinburgh Sophie of Wessex, the captains regent of San Marino, the presidents emeritus of Portugal, Slovenia and Austria.
The European Parliament will be represented by the vice-president and MEP of the Democratic Party, Pina Picierno, while throughout the day the EU and Italian flags at the European Parliament in Brussels remained at half-mast.
And national mourning was proclaimed: flags at half-mast on the facades of all public buildings, while those inside were decorated in mourning. Napolitano's coffin will be welcomed into the Chamber by a Cuirassier picket, while the state funeral ceremony also includes the presence of six carabinieri in full uniform, for military honours.
(Unioneonline/D)
