On 19 October 1920 – exactly a century ago – he was born in Parma Piero Boni, A large socialist trade unionist of the last century, unjustly forgotten. From the grand ducal city he had soon moved with his family to Rome, where he completed his studies graduating in law (his brother was a famous orthopedic doctor, head physician in Pavia). With the name of battle "Peter Coletti”, Boni had been a hero of the Resistance, partisan leader and Silver Medal for Military Valor: participated in the liberation of Parma after spending ten months in the Matteotti Brigades. With a touch of pride, he told the junior leaders about his experience when he was parachuted behind enemy lines. For him, that leap into the void represented throughout his life the moment in which a man must pronounce - as the poet Constantine Cavafis recounts - the big yes or the big no.
In the immediate post-war period, he was first a member of the trade union office of the PSI; he later became part of the secretarial office of the CGIL. Then, as an "adjunct" of Luciano Lama, he moved to the direction of the federation of chemists. In 1957 he joined the Fiom secretariat. In the spring of 1960 he was elected assistant general secretary of the Federation of metalworkers alongside Luciano Lama and member of the federal executive; position that was confirmed in 1962 and 1964, alongside Bruno Trentin. With a singular peculiarity. When Bruno Trentin was proposed in place of Lama, a diarchy was created at the top of the federation, as both Boni and Trentin (a rather rare case) were appointed general secretaries.
Joined the federal secretariat in 1969, Boni actively participated in the challenge of trade union unity with his usual passion, up to the point in which this objective had to be reduced in the federative pact. In 1973 he was elected Deputy Secretary General of the Confederation, a position he held until 1977, the year in which he resigned from the secretariat. This transition was neither easy nor painless. In practice, the resignation was a way out of a situation that had become politically unsustainable. In 1976, in the PSI, after the electoral defeat, there was the turning point of the Hotel Midas which brought Bettino Craxi to the secretariat, with the support of the Lombard CDs led by Claudio Signorile. Boni had remained in solidarity with the previous secretary Francesco De Martino. Agostino Marianetti, then a socialist member of the confederal secretariat, put his candidacy at the head of the socialist current (the Lombard Mario Didò, head of the organization and historical opponent of Boni, supported him), with the support of the party.
Boni resisted the attempt to replace him manu militari as long as he could, then he had to give in. Hence the letter of resignation and the exit from the CGIL (the Communists – including Luciano Lama with whom Boni had worked for years in important roles – did not lift a finger in his defense) with commendable dignity. Was entrusted to him – as sine cura – the Presidency of the Brodolini Foundation (a socialist-inspired cultural center of which a young Renato Brunetta was also secretary) and continued to represent the CGIL at the CNEL (where he had been since 1958) until 1995, when the undersigned, having left the confederal secretariat and the union, was not better able to defend his reappointment. For eleven years he was president of the Labor Commission.
Piero Boni – one of the central figures in the world of work and the union for many decades – died at the end of June 2009, now on the threshold of ninety years. Healthy and sporty, he lived an upright life together with his family: his wife Valentina and their two daughters. In another life Piero and I were bound by a friendly and intense political and personal relationship. With him I began my trade union experience at Fiom in Bologna and became part of the national secretariat, when Boni moved to the secretariat of the CGIL at the Livorno Congress. Our relationship of esteem and friendship continued afterwards, even after his exit (expulsion) from the confederal leadership.
Despite the treatment suffered, Boni remained attached to the CGIL, so much so that he never forgave the critical position I assumed towards the organization; nor my candidacy and election to the Chamber for the People of Freedom. The last time I met him at a convention, I went to greet him with unchanged affection. Boni looked at me sideways and said: “You become more and more so…..o”. I felt like a victim of a wrong, above all because I was not allowed to explain the reasons for my choices. And because in my opinion friendship came before political choices. But that judgment, spelled through clenched teeth, still hurts me. As if it were that of a beloved father towards whom one cannot bear a grudge.
