REPRESSION IN SICILIAN SAUCE
(from Italy IMC)

They came out of their dens all together. The forces of repression in Palermo have decided to fully display their power and their violence to the people who, in this highly controversial town, works with a forgotten community.
On march 3rd the “forces of (dis)order” in full assett turn up at the S.PA.R.O. and force eviction in front of defenceless occupiers.
On saturday the 5th, during a gig at ASK social centre, the police come in great numbers and take three people to the police station. They are charged with assault and resistance to public officers.
A repressive wave that deserve some thoughts at least for the time and way it expressed itself and that asks for questioning and replies from all those whom have been long struggling to defend occupied spaces in Palermo.

The immediate reply to this repressive plan has been a march. On march 10th activists from Palermo’s social centres and antagonist realities joined the march of the “Commitee for the struggle for Homes ‘12 Luglio’” whose mobilitazions suffered too often from repression and indiscriminate charges from the police (especially in summer 2004).
Link to picture of the march on 10/03:  http://italy.indymedia.org/news/2005/03/749067.php


Some background info— translated excerpts from S.PA.R.O. and ASK191 releases
Links to full txts in italian:
 http://italy.indymedia.org/news/2005/03/743355.php
 http://italy.indymedia.org/news/2005/03/745195.php

S.PA.R.O. Release 04/03/2005:
LA LOTTA NON SI SGOMBERA (Struggle cannot be evicted)
On 3rd march at 7am a hundred-ish police and carabinieri in anti-riot gear turn up at the main door of the occupied social centre S.PA.R.O. determined to evict the place, an old and decaying building in the old city centre, occupied in june 2004 by the “collective for the repossession of social spaces”. To the general astonishment of both activists and the community the police forces have militarized the whole square, compacted in a triple cordon, and set roadblocks to all access to the Kalsa neighbourhood, the whole operation was coordinated by the deputy police chief himself who was present.
During the whole morning the collective had display of solidarity from the community living in the neighbourhoods as well as from the other occupied social spaces in town, who all converged in the square as soon as they heard the news. We want to highlight that before yesterday there had been no warnings of imminent eviction.
During the eight months of occupation there have been a number of social activities and struggles promoted by the social centre with particular attention given to the real needs of the community who live in this poor and depressed neighbourhood: from the right to work and home, to the need for cultural and social activities and facilities; and all those inititives have been largely attended and counterbalance the dullness and meanness of the instituions and in particolar of this centre-right wing municipal administration, completely disinterested in tackling the huge problems that affect the working-class neighbourhoods.


ASK191 Release 06/03/2005:
On march 5th, during a party at the ASK social centre in Palermo, two plainclothes cops tried to get in: one was stopped at the entrance, the other managed to get in and was later kicked out. In the meantime 4 or 5 police flying squads and a couple of cars with plainclothes cops arrived, they started taking pictures and provoking in the usual ways. People from inside started to get out to see what was going on and there were some clashes with the cops using batons. Two comrades have been taken to the police station and charged with assault.


Some thoughts (my own) on Palermo:
If your first thought when you hear Palermo is ‘mafia’ well, you’re right. Yet a true understanding of the meaning, context and implications of mafia, is extremely complex and requires, sadly, a first hand prolongued experience in the field. Forget about Il Padrino and Cosa Nostra, we’re not in Hollywood we are in fact in Precarityland. The majority of people live in the total absence of public intervention- no welfare, no services, no jobs, no chances. Mafia is a way of thinking, it’s seeped into the whole context of society, it affects everyone and everything, it’s indivisible from politics and economics.
In Palermo, and not just there, needs and reclaiming rights are dealt with as matters of public order. The old city centre, abandoned and forgotten for years by all administrations, and turned into a sort of ‘extra-territorial zone’ inhabited by immigrants and poor people, is now to be transformed into a sparkling window for luxury tourism and residential areas for the rich and priviledged. Collectives of activists have reclaimed social spaces, they’ve taken decaying buildings and turned them in social spaces open to everyone, and repeteadly asked for a slum clearance which keeps the popular nature of the old city centre, both at residential and economic level, with homes for the poor, markets, and small handcrafts activities.
For a full picture, as usual, just go and see