The League enters Sicily's government: to Salvini's party the councillor for culture, here's who it is

After controversy that lasted several days, the Region of Sicily has a new culture councillor, in the League’s quota: he is Palermo-born Alberto Samonà, born in 1972, a journalist and writer, adviser to the Piccolo Foundation of Calanovella, and head of the culture sector of the Sicilian section of Matteo Salvini’s party. To him, therefore, will go the chair of the regional department of cultural heritage and Sicilian identity. Samonà’s name was announced yesterday by the region’s president, Nello Musumeci. “Alberto Samonà,” he wrote, “is the right synthesis of political militancy and professional competence. I have known him for years and I am certain that he will know how to carry out with passion the role that, in agreement with his party, I wanted to entrust to him.”

The decision to give the League (which enters the island’s junta for the first time in history) the culture councillorship, made official last May 12, had been strongly criticized in Sicily: averted the risk, feared by many, that an alderman of northern origins would swoop into the region (in the early days the name of the Lombard Stefano Candiani circulated, who in the early stages seemed the most papable, but had denied in the hours that had followed the first rumors about his possible appointment), the fact remains that according to many observers the choice is ill-timed, on the one hand because the League did not obtain exciting results in the last regional elections, of November 2017 (the Leghists had presented themselves united with Fratelli d’Italia under a single list, “Alliance for Sicily,” which had obtained 5.6 percent of the vote and 3 seats in the regional council, out of the total of 29 reserved for the majority), and on the other hand because of the symbolic aspect of conferring an aldermanic office with a strong identity value (so much so that it was called “to cultural heritage and Sicilian identity”) to a politician who is an expression of a party that with the South has never had very good relations, at least in “historical” times, and that continues to have a leadership composed of northern politicians.

Samona, welcoming the nomination, however, preferred to tone down the controversy. “This choice,” he said, “makes me really proud because I have always been linked to my land, and if I have remained in Sicily it is because I believe in this island and, despite having had opportunities to leave, I have remained with conviction and with my heart there is still much work to be done, and I am ready to do my part and make a convinced contribution. The criticism of these hours directed at the League I take as a stimulus and as a suggestion and advice to listen also to those who think differently from me. Even those who have an upstream bias against us. But I reiterate I will do everything to listen to all the voices of the world of culture that too often even politics in a deaf way has not received.”

Pictured: Alberto Samonà with Matteo Salvini

The League enters Sicily's government: to Salvini's party the councillor for culture, here's who it is

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