Everyday. Sunday, too. And when he can't, Bustianu Cumpustu leaves a message. «Oje si non acudit – says the last one you read -. I'm sorry." «I'm not here today. I apologize". Everything on Facebook, everything on the Bitzitv page, the social television that the independence leader, ideologue and founder of Sardinia Natzione, created in 2017. To tell about his Bitti «and the surrounding area», he says. To "create a community", also in the footsteps of his father Pietro, Pretu in the village, born in 1923, who was a merchant and watchmaker: "In front of the shop he read the newspaper to the elderly and young people", says Cumpostu.
Bitzitv speaks only one language. «It's a common Sardinian limba», explains the engineer who has been employed in politics. A mission, this one to inform, divided into at least three headings. We start in the morning, between 9.30 and 10, with Ite Novas. The news. «Yes, I must say that they are waiting for me», continues Cumpostu.
I like the Bitzitv format. Over 11 thousand followers on the Facebook page and many ideas for saying good morning. The formula is that of direct . The Internet does the rest, with access also from Australia, Argentina and Japan. Sardinians in the world. «I often talk about issues that, if proposed on a political level, would not pass. Instead, when used in everyday life, they are easier to convey." And then, of course, the press review, with the reading of the Sardinian newspapers which close the news window.
Here is a piece of Cumpustu family history. In Bitti, when dad Pretu raised the shutter of the shop, he already had his audience, who didn't miss reading the newspaper. «It was an event attended by almost only men, especially those aged 40 to 60 and over. People who perhaps hadn't gone to school. My father did: he learned to read and write before becoming a shepherd", a job he later abandoned to dedicate himself to commerce.
Cumpostu witnessed that scene many times, as a child and young boy. «I remember very well the mornings with the gentlemen of the village who settled in front of the shop as soon as they heard the noise of the shutter». The Cumpostu had the classic "colonial shop", where the whole family lent a hand. "There was everything: from nails to pasta and sugar." The resale was in via Arborea, under the church. Anyone who wanted to listen to the news «settled in the sa bicocca, on those steps between the street level and the entrances of houses or shops . Sometimes they even listened to young people who perhaps hadn't gone to school that day." For the neighborhood it was a permanent fixture, on that same stretch of road "where the women, when they allowed themselves a bit of rest, played bingo".
If Ite Novas has a study station, the Ite Capitat column takes Cumpostu around the towns. The camera turns on the events. «Normally these are live broadcasts without comments. The function of this space is to allow people to see with their own eyes. At most I will insert a brief description of the initiative, but nothing more. Everyone must be able to observe without filters."
Cumpostu built his Bitzitv also thinking about the "electronic village" of Michelangelo Pira, the Sardinian writer, anthropologist and intellectual who imagined an island connected by a network. Pira, who published in 1970, certainly could not have imagined the advent of the Internet. But Bitzitv, in its small way, has the function of keeping Bitti's Barbagia together. Even thousands of kilometers away.
Those who follow Bitzitv have the opportunity to participate. In a sort of collective and shared information that has its following in Bitti's Barbagia. An ancient territory, this, as in the traces left by the Nuragic people in the Romanzesu village. So here are "sos tocamentos". The notices. Of birth, death and graduation. «They send me photos with a brief summary and I publish». A few hundred always arrive. And lots of likes.
Bitti's Barbagia is always there, at the center of information and columns. And when Cumpostu is asked who makes him be there every day, he replies: «Bitzitv is a way to cultivate Sardinity. Bitzitv is community, it also has a social function. You can't dedicate yourself to things just to make money."
