H.E.

Silvio Berlusconi
Presidency of the Council of Ministers
Palazzo Chigi
Piazza Colonna 370
00187 Roma - Italy

Dear Sir,

An Open Letter To Silvio Berlusconi.

Please find attached a letter, which we have written to you titled: An Open Letter To
Silvio Berlusconi.

The purpose of the letter is to bring to your attention our concerns regarding the
treatment of the ethnic minority community in Italy.

If you want to discuss any of the issues raised in this letter with us, you can contact us
by email.

Yours faithfully,

Ahmed Olayinka Sule , CFA Kojo Solomon

suleaos@gmail.com kojosolomon@googlemail.com

cc
Chairperson of the African Union Commission
European Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki Moon
 An Open Letter To Silvio Berlusconi

By Ahmed Sule, CFA and Kojo Solomon

27 February 2010

Your Excellency,

We hope this letter meets you in good health and that you are doing well? We are glad
that you have fully recovered from the injuries you sustained as a result of the assault
you experienced in Milan late last year. It is a pity that we live in an unsafe world.

You may be wondering why we are writing this letter to you especially as you don’t
know us. Well, we are concerned about the persistent verbal and physical attacks
inflicted on members of the Italian black community. We feel the need to raise this
issue with you in the public domain because we fear that if these attacks continue
unabated it could spread to other parts of Europe and potentially culminate in the
extinction of the black community in Europe.

Though we are British nationals of African heritage, we are strong admirers of Italian
culture. We appreciate what Italy has given the world in terms of football (including
your A.C. Milan), fashion, food and opera. However, inspite of all these positive
contributions, the persistent ill treatment of members of the black community in Italy
continues to cast a shadow over people’s perception of Italy.

When we made up our minds to air our concerns on these attacks, we deliberated on
the most effective way to communicate these concerns. Our initial thought was to
address this letter to the Italian people. However, we refrained from this approach, as
we believe that it is only a minority section of the Italian population that is involved
in this hate attack. Upon further consideration, we decided to address this letter to
you, because we believe that as Prime Minister, you are better positioned to influence
policies and take actions that can address and minimise these attacks on the black
community.

Before we go any further, we would like to emphasise that we believe that every
country has a right, duty and responsibility to manage and control the flow of
immigration. However, we believe that in the process of carrying out this
responsibility, care needs to be taken to ensure that immigrants are treated as humans
and not animals.

In the past couple of years, Italy has received negative press in relation to the ill
treatment of people in the Black and the Roma community. For instance, in the late
nineties, some football fans openly displayed a 20-meter banner with racially abusive
inscriptions targeted at black players during a football match. In September 2008, six
African immigrants were shot dead in Naples. Furthermore, Marion Balotelli, an
Italian footballer of Ghanaian descent continues to be subjected to damaging racial
abuse by thousands of fans in different stadia around Italy.
A couple of weeks ago, two African immigrants were shot with an air rifle in an
unprovoked attack at Rosarno. This attack, eventually led to clashes between the
African immigrants and the native Italians resident in Rosarno. Unfortunately, rather
than investigate the root cause of the crisis, a government official, blamed the riot on
Italy’s tolerance for immigrants. Shortly after the clashes, majority of the African
immigrants in Rosarno were rounded up and put in detention centres despite the fact
that most of these immigrants held valid visas to wok in Rosarno.

What factors influence these negative attitudes towards members of the black
community in Italy? What are the key drivers that have contributed to these
humiliating, grievous and unwelcome attacks on the black population? There are two
key factors contributing to this high level of intolerance. The first factor relates to the
rhetoric and communication coming from a number of elected officials and politicians
at both national and local level in relation to immigration issues and matters
concerning ethnic minorities. These utterances often vilify members of the black
community and portray immigrants as criminals. The second contributory factor is the
myriad of government policies and immigration laws, which de-humanise immigrants
and often contravenes the UN Declaration on Human Rights.

Rhetoric

We will now address some of the rhetoric coming from government officials and
politicians. It is not uncommon for Italian government officials to make comments
with respect to black people and other ethnic minorities, which can either be
construed, to be racially offensive or which criminalises the people of color. For
instance, sometime ago, a Minister of Reform referring to African immigrants once
remarked, “Italians don't want the ‘Bingo Bongos’ living here”. In another instance,
upon your return from the USA, you publicly remarked that Barack and Michelle
Obama are tanned and that they sunbathe together. In another example, the Mayor of
a town in Italy once suggested that immigrants should be dressed as lepers and shot
with a rifle.

Between 25 October 2009 and 25 December 2009, the Council of Coccaglio

embarked on a drive to get rid of the town’s illegal immigrants. What was shocking
about the campaign was the name given to the operation, which was dubbed
‘Operation White Christmas’. This suggests that it was a calculated attempt to
‘decongest’ the area of black people and make it a predominately white area by
Christmas day. Could the naming of such an operation be a prelude to a bigger plan to
rid the whole of the country from any semblance of blackness? Another example of
degrading communication is with regards to the campaign poster of one of the
political parties, which featured three white sheep’s kicking out a black sheep. This
image was used to advertise the party’s anti-immigration policy.

Policies and laws

As mentioned earlier, a number of government policies and laws have contributed to

the increasing level of intolerance towards the black community. Some of the
government policies proposed or implemented are degrading to the non-white and
other ethnic minority population and often fuels the increasing climate of xenophobia.
The most controversial of these policies is the ‘Security Package’ Law, which was
promulgated in 2008/9. This law contains a number of provisions that violate the UN
Charter on Human Rights. It legalises the use of vigilante groups to supplement the
systematic use of soldiers to patrol city centers. This provision is ill–conceived as it
provides a legal basis for the justification of civilian attacks on immigrants and it
encourages mob attack. There are other disturbing provisions contained within this
law such as extending the detention period for asylum seekers, making irregular
immigration a criminal offence and declaring an emergency state in a number of
Roma and Sinti settlements. In 2008, as part of a crackdown on crime, the Interior
Minister made a proposal to fingerprint all Roma children less than 14 years. This
type of policy clearly demonstrates the extent to which government officials can go to
create a link between immigration and crime even if it means treating children from
ethnic minority communities as criminals.

While some people may argue that strict laws, policies and rhetoric’s are necessary to
curb immigration, others may argue that immigration needs to be controlled in order
to protect the resources of the country. Some may also argue that government officials
need to use inflammatory rhetoric in order to create a linkage between immigrants and
crime. However, despite these arguments, it is important for elected officials and
government officials to note that inflammatory rhetoric and draconian government
policies that target ethnic minorities often encourages elements within a society to
take advantage of what they perceive to be government support to attack these people.

Lessons from history

No matter the sincerity for making these rhetoric and policies, one must learn from
history the consequences of implementing policies that unjustly target a
disadvantaged group within a society. On this basis, we are morally compelled to
bring to your attention two case studies from history, which highlight the dangers that
occur when government unjustly target specific ethnic groups without regard to their
human rights.

Between 1865 and 1964, hundreds of states laws were passed in the USA, which
legalised the segregation and discrimination of the black population. These laws,
(collectively known as Jim Crow Laws) covered almost every aspect of human
endeavor including education, politics, health, transport and housing. The Jim Crow
laws subjected black Americans to high level of poverty, educational under-
achievement, lack of employment opportunities, lynching etc. Even though these laws
were repealed in the late 1960’s, the impact of these laws is still felt today.

Another example of an unjust law used to suppress a particular group of people was
the Apartheid legislation implemented in South Africa between the 1950’s to the
1990’s. Like the Jim Crow laws, the apartheid law succeeded in curtailing the rights
of the non-white population and resulted in loss of lives in addition to contributing to
the economic deprivation of the majority black population.

From the above case studies, we can learn that political leaders need to take utmost
care when implementing unjust laws that target ethnic minorities and other
disadvantaged groups within society.
Just and unjust laws and rhetoric

Martin Luther King, Jr gave an excellent description of what constitutes just and
unjust laws in a letter, which he wrote when he was in a Birmingham jail. Listed
below are three statements extracted from King’s letter:

• “Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human
personality is unjust”
• “Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application”
• “An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a
minority group to obey but does not make binding on itself”

Applying the above statements to the laws and rhetoric’s emanating from Italian
politicians, one can deduce that a number of the immigration policies implemented by
the Italian government conflicts with moral laws thereby rendering these polices
unjust. Likewise, some of the utterances coming from a number of elected officials
can be considered unjust utterances as they often degrade the personality of the
individuals in the black and other ethnic minority communities. When government
officials seek to disparage people in these communities and encourage their citizens to
view immigrants as criminals, they fail to realize that such utterances create a climate
of fear and demoralises a whole community.

In addressing the third of King’s statement referred to above, we would like to ask
these questions:

Would the Italian Government be comfortable and willing to legislate that all Italian
children under the age of fourteen years be fingerprinted?;

Would the Italian Government be comfortable with declaring a state of emergency

throughout Italy?

Would the Italian Government be comfortable if vigilante groups unleash a wave of

brutal attacks on Italian citizens?

Conclusion

In conclusion, we implore you to use your position to engage with government

officials and politicians in re-evaluating your government’s approach towards ethnic
minorities. You may also want to pay particular attention to the application of some of
government’s immigration policies, which regardless of the sincerity of its intention
has often been unjust in its application. Furthermore, we recommend that government
officials should exercise restraint when making offensive comments about ethnic
minorities. Moreover, the use of the rhetoric of fear by elected officials should be
curtailed as it often triggers violent attacks against the vulnerable minority in Italy;
afterall, it was Jean-Paul Sartre who said, “words are loaded pistols”.

Ahmed Olayinka Sule, CFA Kojo Solomon

suleaos@gmail.com kojosolomon@googlemail.com