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Dear friends of La Buvette, the past week was characterized by controversies and tensions among members of the Government majority. At the center of the debate is Italian citizenship for foreigners. Forza Italia returns to the topic (after a scorching summer) and presents a bill causing excitement Matteo Salvini and the League who don’t want to hear about giving citizenship to foreigners. Italy is the first European country to give more citizenships, is there really a need to review the law? It is the question that winds through the halls of power. Today, however, we want to focus on another focus: can giving citizenship to immigrants be a solution to the problem of integration? News stories tell us no. An example is that of Saman Abbas, a young Pakistani woman who, because of her desire to live in a Western way, was punished with death. The parents themselves put an end to his life. A drama that caused a lot of discussion not only among Italians but also in politics. A “hot” topic that the journalist Giammarco Mengacorrespondent of the successful television program Quarto Grado, addressed in his book Saman’s crime.
Giammarco, who was Saman?
“Saman was a young eighteen-year-old halfway between East and West. She wanted to find herself by embracing Western culture, but keeping what was good in Eastern culture. She didn’t have time to become who she wanted to be because she was killed by this clan, by her family who denied her freedom.”
You, who have been there many times and had the opportunity to meet the large Pakistani community, do you think true integration is possible?
“It depends a lot on everyone’s will, there are various communities – I spoke with many people – and it’s all a question of will, of wanting to integrate, of wanting to open up to a new culture. I believe the road is still very long. Many families like Saman’s arrive in Italy only for economic purposes and this does not help integration.”
Saman’s crime talks about this atrocious crime, can we define it as a cultural crime?
“Exactly, it’s not religious but cultural. Statistics tell us that even today it is a widespread crime in countries like Pakistan. Appearance matters more than being, even at the cost of putting aside the primordial love of two parents for their daughter. A daughter who had become unmanageable, who would not marry her betrothed cousin and who was therefore killed in the name of honor.”
Would citizenship for Saman, for his family, have changed things?
“I think little or nothing, because more than a label here we are talking about mentality. Saman was certainly defined as an Italian girl, for me she was a girl who would (maybe) want to become Italian. The family did not want to integrate, so citizenship would have changed little in the minds of these people.”
Could citizenship help bridge the gap between East and West?
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