Virginia Raggi has just blown out her first candle as mayor of Rome but it will be better to postpone the holidays. The risk she runs is that now the Prosecutor of the Capital will turn her off, sending her to trial for forgery and abuse of office on municipal appointments and reviving the justicialist wing of the 5 Star Movement right in the middle of the next electoral campaign. Fortunately, Beppe Grillo, from his immeasurable wisdom, reminded us, on the occasion of the municipal elections in Genoa, that "one is worth one" is indeed a distinctive trait of the Five Stars but only when it suits him and when he decides. . And Rome, as we know, is not Genoa.
Jokes aside, it would be a real shame if the first grillino mayor of the capital fell through the courts. It is true that the city is falling apart, that waste is suffocating it, that the rats are dancing, that the potholes in the roads are still there, that public transport is third world, but the Raggi critics should take a good time 'examination of conscience and wondering: where do we find another mayor who, instead of apologizing to the citizens who voted for him a year ago by plebiscite or worrying about the free fall of his approval rating due to the absolute nullity of his administrative action, a light pound on the evils of Rome and impudently gives itself a big vote, a good 7 and a half. Presumption, egocentrism, pride? But no, none of that. Indeed, Raggi deserves much, much more. Let's say it without hypocrisy and with the risk of taking the insults of the Romans: we at Raggi would give a good 10 with honors.
But wouldn't the legendary mayors of the capital of the past – from Nathan to Argan and Petroselli – turn over in their graves? Absolutely not, because they would probably have agreed too, agreeing that Raggi doesn't deserve top marks as the best mayor in history (which would be a bit complicated to prove) but because she has the undisputed and incomparable merit of existing.
Without Raggi at the helm of the Campidoglio, all the talk about the grillini would be just bar talk or prejudices that leave the time they find. Raggi, on the other hand, helps us solve an otherwise impossible political theorem: how does the 5 Star Movement govern when it conquers a large reality, like Rome yesterday and perhaps Italy tomorrow?
Until now, the popular prejudice was that M5S was very good at leading the protest, but did not have the faintest idea of how to govern a big city or even a country. But then Pizzarotti, Appendino and above all Raggi arrived. Pizzarotti amazed everyone by administering his Parma very well but was thrown out of the Movimento by Grillo. In Turin, Appendino took advantage of her Bocconi studies and her belonging to the good Savoy bourgeoisie to guide the city administration with balance, net of the very serious lightness on public order and safety demonstrated in Piazza San Carlo on the occasion of the final Champions League between Juve and Real Madrid. But Turin is not Rome and perhaps Appendino should apologize to the previous municipal administration of Fassino and the Democratic Party for demagogically comparing the Piedmontese capital to Calcutta during the electoral campaign.
Then there's Raggi. Superficially there are those who, perhaps thinking of the No to the Olympics, accuse her of stagnation, but it is wrong. That of the mayor of Rome is not stagnation, but backwardness, because, if not resolved, the many problems of the capital do not always remain at the same point, but they get worse. The same goes for waste, whose emergence reminds Naples of its worst days, the same goes for potholes, which are now a mortal danger for cyclists and motorcyclists and are lucky for car repair shops, the same goes for public transport . The most classic derby, the one between Rome and Milan, hasn't been played for a long time because the capital, outclassed by the revival of Milan, is no longer in the game.
Yet, net of these reverses and these disasters, Giuliano Ferrara is perfectly right to argue in the Foglio that Raggi deserves an award because, with its commendable lightness and its incomparable inconsistency, it demonstrates with Swiss precision what the grillini do when they govern and what they wouldn't be able to do if they won the national elections and conquered Palazzo Chigi. Worstness? But no, only that whoever believes in fairy tales should wake up sooner or later and the buckets of frozen water that Raggi spills on him every day are a boon. "The twelve months of our beloved Virginia - writes Ferrara - are not to be crucified, they are to be monumentalised". Well said. Heartfelt thanks, Virginia. Thanks for existing.
