Italy: Is
the Far Right Alright?
Radio Télévision Suisse | 13min
Postproduction script
00:00:00,620 Giorgia Meloni: -I am Giorgia... I am a woman, a mother, I am an Italian, a Christian, and no one, no one will ever take that away from me.
0’06 19th October 2019
00:00:12,519 VO: -God, country and
family. Since her speech, her party has moved from 4% to 25% of the vote. Giorgia
Meloni fires up the crowds with her ultra conservative remarks. For instance last June when she was invited to the congress of
the neo-Francoist party Vox, Spain.
00:00:31,680 Meloni on stage: -Either we say yes, or we say no, Yes to natural family. No to the LGBT lobby. Yes to sexual identity. No to gender ideology.
0’36 Marbella, 15th
June 2022
00:00:47,885 VO: -What is her real speech? The one of the Pasionaria or the more reassuring one when she tries to
erase her label as a post-fascist?
00:00:58,536 Meloni on video: -Freedom is to us the greatest gift of all. Our historic judgment is based on freedom, which is our only compass. Many decades ago, the Italian right relegated fascism to history. It condemned with no ambiguity the deprivation of democracy and the infamous anti-Semitic laws.
1’02 6th August 2022 Giorgia Meloni, Leader, Fratelli D’Italia
1’25 Title – Italy: Are the Far
Right Alright?
00:01:38,514 VO: -In April, about a hundred people met in Predappio to commemorate the death of Mussolini. A group of
nostalgic former soldiers came to pay homage to the Duce. A procession
authorized by the authorities while the justification of fascism is forbidden
by the Italian Constitution.
00:02:03,879 Mirko Santarelli to
crowd: -Mussolini is not dead. Your presence proves it. After nearly 100 years,
they are still here to hammer our brains out, to try to erase the memory, the
greatness of this man, that no one will succeed to erase from history.
00:02:24,134 VO: -A tribute in the purest fascist tradition.
In silence, they wait to enter the crypt, where the Duce's
tomb has been since 1956.
00:02:38,988 Mirko to crowd: Comrade Benito Mussolini, here!
Break ranks, my friends.
00:02:55,035 Count Farneti Merenda Salecchi: -We commemorate the man who was sent to us by divine providence. At school, nobody taught us that.
3’01 Count Farneti
Merenda Salecchi
00:03:06,276 VO: -Many Italians still think that Mussolini was the last man who knew how to govern Italy. They write it on the register of tributes. In the political party that could win the election, the Duce nostalgics are in the thousands.
00:03:22,165 Mirko: -A lot of them! We shouldn't say it, but I'm telling you. Many people feel a kind of nostalgia for Mussolini. If you talk about Fratelli d'Italia, at least 80% of supporters think this way. They can't say that, because in Italy, you have to declare yourself anti-fascist. Everyone I know shares this idea.
3’36 Mirko Santarelli,
Organiser of Benito Mussolini commemorations
00:03:43,105 Reporter: -Can we say that their leader,
Meloni, is a little fascist?
00:03:49,630 Mirko: -I don't say so. I can't say it. But
certainly, I hope so! She kept the little flame. And this is the famous flame
of the Italian Social Movement.
00:04:08,444 VO: -In Predappio,
the headquarters of the fascist party falls into ruin. However, Mussolini's
native city has become the place for fascism nostalgics. Here the Duce is sold
in all forms. Trinkets of an often questionable taste.
The organizer introduces us to Suzy.
00:04:28,720 Mirko: -She comes from Bergamo, she arrived
with her outfit.
00:04:35,211 VO: -Still wearing her black shirt, Suzy does
not miss any of the commemorations. She lives in the hills of Lombardy. Her
apartment is a kind of sanctuary. She has some unique objects. Each one is
connected to the fascination that the Duce has had on her since her teen years.
00:04:56,040 Suzy Cortinovis: -I
like it when I get up in the morning and I drink my coffee in front of all
this. Here I feel at home.
00:05:07,379 VO: -Mussolini is at the heart of Suzy's life. He
dictates her choices, her tattoos, her clothes, her jewellery. Everything in
her is fascist.
00:05:18,000 Suzy: -To tell the truth, for me, fascism is like faith, you have to be a believer. You have to respect what he did, and you must respect the teachings, beginning with God, country and family.
5’23 Suzy Cortinovis
00:05:33,000 VO: -Suzy asks for the return of compulsory
military service. Behind her smile, she tells us that she is against the mixing
of races. To block the migrants, her solution is kind of radical.
00:05:45,942 Suzy: -I would put mines into the sea. Meloni
won't be able to do it, but I would do it. If you enter my house, you ask
permission.
00:05:55,960 Reporter: -Do you see a bit of Mussolini in
Meloni?
00:06:00,100 Suzy: -I see in her what Mussolini was. I see
in her a person who believes in her values.
00:06:06,840 Reporter: -When she says that she has relegated
fascism to history, isn't that a betrayal?
00:06:12,749 Suzy: -No, because according to you, why did
she say it? It's just a power play, and she's walking on thin ice.
00:06:24,590 VO: -It's in Trento's Museum of Aeronautics that
Francesco Filippi gave us an appointment. A place
that reminds us that fascism was above all a regime of war and propaganda. This
historian considers that the Duce nostalgics are not dangerous, because they
are too few in number.
00:06:43,425 Francesco Filippi: -But be careful, there is another category of people, that is much larger and more sensitive in numbers, which has a sick relationship with our past. This is the category of those that we can define as unconscious fascists. There are millions of them and they have understood very little about the responsibility for this dismal past. They think that the 20 years of fascism was a period when the fascists did some good things.
6’52 Francesco Filippi, Author of Are there
good dictators?
00:07:10,033 VO: -In his books, he tries to dismantle the
clichés about Mussolini, the so-called good dictator. He tries to understand
why some Italians are, without knowing it, a bit fascist, or at least attracted
by ideas with fascist overtones.
00:07:25,570 Francesco Filippi: -In
Italy, there is a revival of fascist themes. A return of that past, of those 20
mystified years. And an exaltation of the politicians who refer to this fascist
past. This means not only that this past has not been digested and explained
historically, but that means that being a fascist today is not a negative thing
to run for politics. This is the result of decades of abandoning anti-fascist
ideas.
00:08:01,035 VO: -That evening, Meloni's
electoral campaign stops in Perugia. A city that passed to the right after 70
years of left-wing management. The region's Senate candidate quickly brushes
off the accusations of a party with fascist sympathies.
00:08:17,240 Francesco Zaffini: -Everyone in his soul, in his heart, in his head, cultivates what he wants. There are people who are nostalgic for Stalin. Nostalgic for communism or Che Guevara. There are monarchist nostalgics. And of course, there are nostalgics of fascism. But this has nothing to do with Fratelli d'Italia.
8’24
Francesco Zaffini, Fratelli D’Italia
candidate, Umbria
00:08:44,483 VO: -Is Fratelli d'Italia
a patriotic and modern party based on three pillars: God, Fatherland, Family?
00:08:52,225 Old man: -I don't know if you can say it like
that. But God exists. The fatherland exists, and the third is what? Oh yes, the family exists... I don't see the problem.
00:09:07,720 VO: -In the crowd, we quickly understand that
removing the tricolor flame from the party logo would
mean the direct loss of many voters.
00:09:16,515 Man on street: -Like many, I believe in this
flame. I believe in what it represents and I am glad that Meloni did not remove
it.
00:09:28,307 Woman: -Right now, we need rules. Yes, go back
in time a bit to reclaim our fundamental rights.
00:09:38,360 Woman 2: -That's what being far right is all
about: bringing back some order. Right now, we're in the middle of a decline,
order no longer exists.
00:09:49,848 VO: -The activists of Fratelli d'Italia are not all nostalgic for Mussolini. But nostalgic
for the image of Italy's greatness. The only Italian journalist threatened with
death by neo-fascist groups lives in Bergamo. Placed under police protection, he
gave us a discreet meeting place.
00:10:09,315 Paolo Berizzi: -We can believe Meloni when she says that she is not a fascist. We can say that Fratelli d'Italia is not a party that can technically be defined as neo-fascist. But Fratelli d'Italia is full of fascists. There are euro-parliamentarians militants, who have a fascist history. They make appeals to the fascist past.
10’14 Paolo Berizzi,
Journalist, La Repubblica
00:10:40,303 VO: -To write his articles, Paolo Berizzi has investigated on the past
of the Fratelli d'Italia's candidates. Fascist
greetings, mausoleum inauguration ceremonies honoring
war criminals, the Internet doesn't forget anything.
00:10:54,600 Paolo: -The risk is not the return of fascism
as we have known it, because historically, it's not possible. The real risk is
a shift of our democracy to a 'democrature'. A
weakened democracy which tends to authoritarian drifts. The emblematic case is
that of Hungary with Orban.
00:11:22,589 VO: -During her electoral turn, Meloni gave the
best of herself. Inflamed speeches where she lists the many problems of Italy.
00:11:31,641 Meloni on stage: -Immigration... Here people
will obviously say, 'Meloni is a racist, shame on her'
00:11:39,414 VO: -A bit of humour before exposing her vision
on immigration.
00:11:45,053 Meloni on stage: -I consider that if you bring
someone in here, you don't let him sell drugs. The women, you don't let them
prostitute themselves. Yes, there are safety issues, and you can't tell, because
the left is in solidarity with the raped women. Only if the rape is not caused
by an illegal immigrant. In their scale of values, the illegal immigrant is
more important than the raped woman.
00:12:16,311 VO: -Despite the extremist arguments of her speeches, if Meloni wins, and becomes the first female president of Italy, she will have to demonstrate quickly that she represents a right-wing conservative party, but also a modern and democratic right, At the risk of disappointing those who see in her the worthy heiress of the Duce's legacy.
12’45 Credits:
Valérie Dupont
Giuseppe Mariani
Filippo Traversa
Antonio Lalli
Paolo Dorliguzzo
Fanny Lelong
Edgard Biondina