Become citizens aware of their rights through concrete lessons. This is the message that emerged during the meeting that took place today in the IPSCOAA HIGHER INSTITUTION “RITA LEVI MONTALCINI” of Botricello, in the province of Catanzaro. The meeting, entitled “Right to legality, for a more right world”, proved to be an important opportunity to reflect on the themes of justice, equity and human rights. The meeting was attended authoritative speakers who provided students with interesting ideas of deepening and comparison. After the institutional greetings of the school manager, Giovanna Moscato, the mayor of Botricello Simone Saverio Puccio and the parish priest Don Rosario Morrone, we have entered the heart of complex and current issues starting from the origins of human rights until their statement. From the Hammurabi stele, passing through the magna paper and the declaration of human rights, the speakers have outlined the long and rough path of human justice.
Alessandra Coppolino, expert of the Prison Observatory of the Criminal Chamber of Catanzaro, and Irma Conti, representative of the office of the National Guarantor for the rights of prisoners, underlined the need to consider the prison sentence as a re -education tool rather than mere punishment. On this aspect all the speakers have focused several times involving students even with direct experiences. On the same wavelength the interventions of Francesco Iacopino, president of the Criminal Chamber of Catanzaro, of the lawyers Maria Jiritano, Piero Mancuso and Vincenzo Galeota, who have focused, from different perspectives, on the current situation of Italian prisons, traveled.
In prisoners there are mainly people in conditions of extreme poverty, often foreigners and with psychiatric problems, in structures that are however at the limit of collapse for overcrowding. A reality that screeches with the constitutional principles of humanity and rehabilitation of the penalty. The lawyer Mancuso reiterated the importance of the work “which makes free”, then referring to the massacres in which the judges Falcone and Borsellino lost their lives. Furthermore, the intervention of the lawyer Orlando Sapia of the Directive Criminal Chambers and referent Observatory prison that explained to students the importance of the presence of the institutions. Finally, the magistrate Graziella Viscomi, a deputy prosecutor of Catanzaro, launched significant warning to the boys, among these to always rebel against “things we don’t like” in the ways and in the times of legality because there is always an alternative.
During the whole debate, a strong and clear message has been released: the school has a duty to form more aware and sensitive citizens towards those suffering, even if it is serving a sentence. For this, just From the “Rita Levi Montalcini” Institute a concrete idea was born: the manager Moscato and the lawyer Galeota announced the stipulation of a PCto convention (paths for transversal skills and orientation) which will allow the students of the IPSCOA to go to the juvenile penitentiary of Catanzaro. Here they will be able to teach and share with young detainees the passion for food and wine, showing that cooking is not only a profession, but a creative act capable of generating inner freedom. An initiative that goes beyond words, transforming solidarity into concrete action.
