In the Transport pavilion at the Rimini Meeting, the light is blue, the kids line up at the flight simulators, and from the Autostrade per l’Italia space rises a two-meter-high statue of Corto Maltese. Today at 5 pm Matteo Salvini arrives to talk about railways with Fs CEO Gianpiero Strisciuglio; four hours earlier, and in a providentially distant pavilion, it’s Attilio Fontana’s turn, president of Lombardy.
Roberto Formigoni, who on Saturday was among the guests of honor listening to the Pope, governed that region for 18 years. The northern issue, first raised by Giuseppe Guzzetti, remains political. Should Salvini listen to the governors of the North?
“First of all, let me say that Salvini was invited to the Meeting as Minister of Transport.” That’s the institutional aspect. The political one? “No, the northern issue is not resolved. Differentiated autonomy has been provided for in the Constitution since 2001, when the left was in power. From 2001 to 2026, governments of all colors have succeeded each other and no one has done it.”
PRODI’S STOP
Formigoni made some progress with Prodi in 2006, but “in 2008 the League blocked everything.” Umberto Bossi told him to his face: “The Lega ministers don’t want autonomy to be linked to your name.” They wanted to claim it for themselves. “Historical nemesis: it’s 2026 and no one has managed to do it.” And a real autonomy, he adds, not “that mess Calderoli is making.” Fontana “rightly complains.”
Meloni spoke last year on the last day. This year she’s not here: would she have received the same applause? “Maybe a decibel less.”
Acoustic estimate. “She had to face unforeseen difficulties: Trump’s attitude didn’t scar her, but weakened her. And if last summer she could boast great government successes, today gasoline prices rise, diesel excise discounts expire, inflation increases, the budget law has not given obvious benefits to citizens, the referendum defeat weighs.” Yesterday at the fair, the Minister of Environment and Energy Security Pichetto Fratin explained that the Council of Ministers is not convened and that a decision will be made in the coming hours, watching “whether the Strait of Hormuz opens or not.”
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She was here 44 years ago. In 1982 Italy was frightening: double-digit inflation, terrorism that was ending but not over, Calvi found dead under a bridge in June, Dalla Chiesa killed in Palermo five days after the Pope’s visit. It was also the summer of the World Cup, of Pertini at the stadium, of a young, optimistic country. Today we face wars whose fronts merge: from Ukraine to the Kuril Islands, from the Middle East to Korea. And Moscow increases hybrid attacks on Europe. “This is why the Pope speaks everywhere of peace and begs the powerful of the world to convert: Leo does not offer political solutions, but invites to love the destiny of man. For this to happen, peace is needed.”
The Pope spoke of a false realism “that re-arms minds, words, and nations.” Will Europe be capable of true realism? Something is awakening, says Formigoni, and “the clear support for Ukraine is a watershed. For eighty years we lived between two pillows. Now the United States no longer supports us, China devours, Russia advances.” Yesterday’s meetings were: housing emergency, migrant minors, Israel and Palestine, and Mentana, increasingly restless, in Rimini as on La7, on present Italy. Tomorrow Pizzaballa closes. Is this the left’s agenda? He remains unfazed: “The Meeting has always spoken with everyone, it has always been everyone’s home, it has always invited people who have something to say.”
POLITICS AND PRIORITIES
This year, 13 ministers pass through and none come from the Movement. In 1984 she entered the European Parliament with 450,000 preferences. Where has that leadership class gone? “At the time the environment was not hostile to Christianity: we could talk about work, family, protection of unborn life, education. Today no party is the voice of these issues.” It ended with the First Republic: CL members voted DC because the bishops and the Pope asked for it. After Tangentopoli “we chose the center-right and Forza Italia because we were not asked to renounce our values.” Now “Forza Italia is faltering.” Her place has remained in the center, “which continues to live in the center-right.” Not Calenda’s then. “Calenda is autonomous, but not always. He represents more a geographical center than a value-based one.” On the left, simply, the center does not exist: “Moderates in the PD are treated worse than strays.” Where do those votes go? In the Futuro Nazionale program, Vannacci includes tax exemptions for families, a tricolor mortgage with a rate that decreases with each child, a parental income. “He says important things on which other center-right parties do not express themselves. Fortunately, the elections are not the day after tomorrow, but before keeping him out of the alliance, if this is the value framework, I would think about it.” And the Russian leanings? “He should change some of the program points unacceptable to the center-right. That’s how coalitions are made.”
