CasaPound: "Leoncavallo? The eviction is a bluff, it's just business. We'll defend the building, we're not moving from here."

He hadn't ruled out an eviction of CasaPound , the building occupied by the far-right movement of the same name in Rome, following the eviction of the Leoncavallo social center in Milan. "Sooner or later, its turn will come," declared Interior Minister Matteo Piantedosi , speaking at the Rimini Meeting. When Deputy Prime Minister and League Secretary Matteo Salvini and Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni celebrated legality and rejoiced over the eviction in Milan, many took issue and asked: so what about CasaPound?

CasaPound has occupied a publicly owned building since 2003. It is located on Via Napoleone III, in the Esquilino neighborhood of central Rome. Before being occupied by right-wing social centers, it housed the offices of the Ministry of Education. Since then, the "fascists of the third millennium" movement has become national, sometimes even running as a political party before abolishing that electoral experience after receiving 0.33% of the vote in the 2019 European elections. Culture Minister Alessandro Giuli had declared that CasaPound may not be evicted "to the extent that it aligns itself with legal criteria." Piantedosi has also hypothesized a similar path. "The City of Rome has even purchased facilities to legalize them; it has happened in other cities as well."

The six-story building was seized in May 2020, costing the State Property Agency €4.6 million in lost revenue, according to the Court of Auditors. Piantedosi himself, in May 2022, had placed the building sixth in the eviction plan. "Unlike what they failed to do at Leoncavallo, if they were to come to evict us, we will defend the building. This is not a declaration of war or a provocation. But our occupation cannot be compared to that of Milan," CasaPound Italia spokesperson Luca Marsella stated in an interview with Il Corriere della Sera .

"The Milan operation was a bluff to regularize an illegal situation . There was no eviction, but an agreement with the municipality to move him to a warehouse [...] Behind it all is pure business . Millions are being spent, but not on our occupation, where we assist twenty Italian families on a rotating basis," Marsella added. "I believe Minister Giuli has understood what we need: to be legalized ; we don't want to remain squatters forever. But we won't move from here."

The eviction of the Leoncavallo Center was decided by the prefect, without the cooperation of the center-left Milan city council, last Thursday. Surprisingly, the bailiff was expected in early September. The Center opened in its original location, on the street of the same name, in the mid-1970s. It was moved to a former paper mill in 1994 on Via Watteau, in the Greco neighborhood. The eviction had been postponed approximately 130 times. The property is owned by a company owned by the Cabassi family.

FROM

Web Editorial Staff