If we were in the Star Wars universe it could be Luke Skywalker's small aircraft, the Starfighter with which the hero manages to penetrate the Death Star causing it to explode. Or, for those not accustomed to the epic invented by George Lucas, it could resemble the classic grain of sand that jams the great mechanism.
We are talking about "small" case at the tip of the Statute raised in the CGIL house by a tenacious and young lawyer from Pescara, a member of the National Board of Fisac, the category that brings together bank and insurance workers.
To mention names and surnames, Francesca Carnoso "versus" Nino Baseotto, General Secretary of the category, former Organizational Secretary of Susanna Camusso and in the same role also in the CGIL of Maurizio Landini.
This will be discussed on 27 January at the meeting of the National Executive of the trade union in which Landini intends to participate in person, to avoid, so to speak, distractions from the members, on an expression of vote which seems to have regrouped, after the events of July 2020, a considerable part of the category.
This is the story.
Nino Baseotto, long-time CGIL manager, elected General Secretary of the trade union in July 2020, after a life in the union organization that began in 1976, turned 65 on 31 December last year and according to the rules imposed by the Statute he can no longer lead the Fisac, unless he had requested the extension of the mandate at the right time as always foreseen by the Statute, an extension that can be waived, but which must be voted on and approved by the qualified majority of the National Executive.
However, since he has not submitted to any request, the Secretary must be considered forfeited.
On the question, the National Statutory College expressed itself declaring the question posed by the lawyer unfounded, who in an interview with Firstonline said she was "certain that the convocation of the National Executive of 27 January will make it possible to heal the democratic vulnerability which I noted by presenting the appeal, although not accepted in my request ". But that "while fully respecting the National Statutory Board of the CGIL I cannot fully agree with the terms of the resolution, since the rules either apply to everyone or are called privileges".
It could appear just a matter of goat's wool, or even a small formality.
“It may seem so – says Carnoso – but it is not at all. It's not just a legal issue, I know very well that trade union assemblies are not courtrooms, however the signature of the Secretary General, due to the binding mandate conferred by the representation, is the one which, for example, allows the production of effects of national contracts; if whoever represents the category were not legally in the exercise of his/her functions, any agreement could be invalidated in court for apparent representation”.
The line of reasoning, but how is it possible that it happened such a sensational "oversight". in the largest Italian trade union?
“If one can speak of an oversight, with all the benefit of the doubt, I think that this can generally happen for two reasons - continues Carnoso - both serious: either that they do not remember or know the rules of the Statute or that they believe they are superior to them ”.
Like “everyone is equal, but some are more equal than others”, that phenomenon analyzed decades ago by the great George Orwell in "Animal Farm" and which is considered the most serious vice of a lot of the left.
Waiting for the day of the final "duel", with the outcome perhaps obvious, considered the presence of the maximum leader of the CGIL at the meeting, however, it is not yet clear why the lawyer made the episode a battle within "her" union.
We need to take a step back. Carnoso, for several years a member of the national political apparatus of Fisac CGIL as head of the National Legal Department, had been identified, even if not officially, as a potential hypothesis of replacement in the national leadership; but once Nino Baseotto has been elected, she had been ousted in whole from the national organization chart and therefore also from the management of the Department under your control, and it also seems from the political delegation on an important banking group.
As often happens when a woman is involved, the expulsion was also followed by slander in various capacities, while an attempt was made to remove her from active roles in the organization with equally classic arguments: you stay at home, you take care of the children, stay in the shadows for a while, then you can see. She had also been informed indirectly that if she resigned from the National Executive she would in exchange have trade union positions for the Confederation.
Carnoso confirms everything: “Certainly it hasn't been easy months, but I've always thought and I think with conviction that personal issues, precisely because they lack political merit, are never a discussion ground on which to compete; the true fact is that between me and the CGIL there is a strong bond of belonging proven by my personal and family history; and I also think that respecting the rules is an element of great strength for the CGIL to attract the younger generations".
To date we still do not know how the scrutiny on Baseotto will be carried out, the possibility does not escape the possibility that secret voting will be required, as in the possibilities of the Statute, a practice to which Landini has historically often appealed to guarantee individual freedom and democratic expression .
To give one last touch to the description of Francesca Carnoso in the union they have often called her the "Renzi" of the CGIL, evidently in terms of audacity and effrontery.
The lawyer also confirms this, however, specifying that: “The union is inevitably a political actor, but it is not a party. What has opened up in the category is not a crisis, but a useful moment of reflection to all to rediscover or confirm the noble reasons for our work, a work not oriented towards the mere management of power or the contingent, but a work of thought and action oriented towards the service of people, today even more bent by social, economic and employment difficulties that the pandemic emergency has brought about".
How will Landini come out of it? It's not a good time for the CGIL, the waters are not only agitated in the Federation of Via Vicenza, headquarters of Fisac in Rome, but also in the corridors of Corso d'Italia, in the national one, where the climate on the 4th noble floor is not the most relaxed, since, blow whispers, consortia are at work aiming to question even the role of the Secretary General.
But that's another story. To go back to "meat case", it is probable that in the end the great mechanism will get going again, that the pebble will have done no damage to the gears of the organization and that perhaps we will work to "remove it from our shoes". But you can bet on it, the game seems to have only just begun.
Like in Star Wars.
Respect for the rules? Same rules for everyone?
I don't think anyone believes that anymore!!!
See under "Piedmont FIlt commissioner"
The bank has ruined me after 30 years or lost a job or an income and or had problems with an old car I lack food but they make me die big I hope one day they stop crushing those who have been a metal worker for 30 years but god there will be