President Meloni’s speech at the ceremony at the Chamber of Deputies for the presentation of a display case dedicated to Paolo Borsellino

Good afternoon everyone, thank you for the invitation, my sincere thanks for inviting me to this ceremony.

My greetings go to all the authorities present, particularly President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella, and I also wish to convey my greetings and sincerest thanks above all to those who have made it possible for us to be here today and write a page of Parliament’s history together. I therefore wish to greet and offer my warmest regards to Lucia and Manfredi Borsellino and their relatives who are here today. I would also like to mention Fiammetta who was unable to be here today, but I am sure she is following us.

I wish to thank Maresciallo Canale and his daughter Manuela who, with their great gesture of love and generosity, have made it possible for one of Public Prosecutor Borsellino’s most important and dear belongings, his briefcase, to be placed at the heart of our democracy, thereby becoming a visible symbol and therefore also serving as the warning it deserves to be.

As I have spoken about many times, my political commitment began after the Via D’Amelio bombing. 33 years have passed since then. I still have an extremely clear memory of that day, of that moment, of how hot it was, of the dinette in my mother’s house and the images of the devastation on the news. And that sudden sense of urgency and feeling there was no point in being angry unless you could also turn that anger into something, into a gesture, a commitment, mobilisation.

That day marked the beginning of the path that led me to become President of the Council of Ministers, two and a half years ago now. Perhaps one of the greatest emotions I have felt was when I went to the President of the Republic to formally accept the mandate and present the list of Ministers; after that step, it is necessary to go to the President of the Chamber of Deputies and the President of the Senate, and so I came to visit President Fontana (whom I also wish to greet and thank), after I had also gone to President La Russa, and when I walked in, I was met with a giant poster of Paolo Borsellino, as the Chamber of Deputies was hosting an exhibition on anti-mafia heroes. This was an extraordinary feeling for me, because it was as if I had come full circle: the person to whom I owed my political commitment was there at the very moment I arrived at what is perhaps the most significant role that political mobilisation can offer – although that isn’t quite the right word – to which you can commit yourself.

This is my personal story, but it wasn’t just me who was motivated by Paolo Borsellino’s sacrifice and that of the public servants who were by his side on that 19 July 1992 – Agostino, Claudio, Emanuela, Walter, Vincenzo. Mine is like the story of so many people from those years; the story of many others who, following those mafia massacres, decided to take action, because we must remember that those massacres gave rise to a popular movement which, for the first time, visibly said no. It visibly said no to the violence, blackmail, code of silence and illegality to which the mafia wanted to condemn Italy. Cosa Nostra greatly underestimated what the Italian people’s reaction would be to what it wanted to be terror, to the terror it wanted to unleash. At that point, millions of Italians preferred engagement over indifference, courage over apathy, a sense of duty over lethargy. In other words, they chose to follow the nation’s path of honour, as opposed to the false honour of men claiming to be honourable.

Paolo Borsellino taught us that being afraid is only human, but that when you fight to defend what you believe in, courage can be stronger than that fear. And that was the spark of a fire of hope, justice and love for Italy.

33 years on, his legacy firmly lives on in the hands of the many people who, also following his example, continue to fight the mafia every day. That legacy finds form and substance in the efforts against organised crime made by institutions at all levels, defending and strengthening the anti-mafia legislation named after him and Giovanni Falcone, which has become a model internationally. I go all over the world and have just come back from the G7: at the G7, out of the seven G7 statements, there is one that talks about fighting criminal organisations using the ‘follow the money’ principle; today, this is in the public domain at international level, but it began here. Then there is the tireless search to shed light on what are still the dark pages of those years in our history. Italians have the right to know the truth and all efforts to find out the truth must be supported, such as the work being carried out in this direction, with courage and determination, by the parliamentary anti-mafia committee. My thanks to the committee’s Chair and all its members.

This display case contains a public prosecutor’s briefcase. We know that briefcases have now been replaced by somewhat more technological tools – laptops and other such devices. 40 years ago, any judicial officer would have carried important papers in such a bag, which meant there were fears and sacrifices, the work they would take home outside of office hours, that large part of their life they decided to dedicate to something they truly believed in. To many today, it may seem like some kind of artefact, but I believe that, also for today’s young judicial officers, it is something more: it is a symbol of duty and dedication to service throughout one’s life, even when not wearing the robes. For the truth is that, as was also the case for Giovanni Falcone and Rosario Livatino, Paolo Borsellino did not work as a public prosecutor, he was a public prosecutor. A public prosecutor who loved justice, the truth and freedom.

In closing, and I thank you all again, I think that the most just and most beautiful thing we can do to honour this extraordinary man, these extraordinary men, is to fight to assert the same values, with the same determination and the same courage, every minute of every single day, just like they did.

Thank you.