{"id":765,"date":"2011-06-23T12:57:50","date_gmt":"2011-06-23T12:57:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/?p=765"},"modified":"2011-08-01T20:07:15","modified_gmt":"2011-08-01T20:07:15","slug":"il-referendum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/il-referendum\/","title":{"rendered":"Il Referendum"},"content":{"rendered":"

On the 12th and 13th of June the Italian people were called to vote in a popular referendum which required them to make decisions about three important issues:<\/span><\/p>\n

1. Energia Nucleare<\/strong> (Nuclear Energy). In a previous referendum held in 1987 following the Chernobyl disaster, Italians voted to shut down our three existing nuclear plants, and to put a stop to any future production of nuclear energy in Italy. On several occasions the government has tried to reintroduce the possibility of nuclear energy production with no avail, until last year, when Berlusconi’s government managed to sneak in a law paving the way to resuscitate the nuclear industry. This law was hidden within the proposed reforms for schools and universities! Luckily Silvio’s trick didn’t go unnoticed by the IdV (Italia dei Valori<\/strong>, Italy of the Values, a left-wing political party), i Verdi (The Green Party) and other organizations such as Greenpeace Italia, who immediately started the process which led to last week’s referendum.<\/span><\/p>\n

2. Privatizzazione dell’acqua <\/strong>(Water privatization). Last year the government approved a decree according to which over the next few years all water boards would become societ\u00e0 per azioni<\/strong>, that is private companies with shares quoted on the stock market. This would mean that the shareholders could be foreign companies, and that consequently prices would be likely to soar to ensure ‘healthy’ profits. Again, many consumers’ protection organizations immediately started the process of collecting signatures all over the country in order to bring about a referendum with the aim of repealing the privatization of water.<\/span><\/p>\n

3. Legittimo impedimento<\/strong> (Literally: Legitimate Impediment). This is what we call ‘una legge ad personam’ <\/strong>(a law created to protect the interests of one person). Bear in mind that il Presidente del Consiglio <\/strong>(the Prime Minister) a.k.a. il Cavaliere Silvio Berlusconi<\/strong> is being investigated for a series of crimes, amongst which corruption, bribery, and having sex with an under age prostitute. Now imagine how useful it would be for him to have a law which gave him and any of his Ministers immunity on the ground that they are impeded from attending court and standing trial due to their governmental responsibilities. This is, in fact, exactly what the law of legittimo impedimento<\/strong> means. Once again the IdV party set out to organize the referendum with the aim of abolishing this law.<\/span><\/p>\n

I risultati <\/strong>(the results):<\/span><\/p>\n

For the first time in sixteen years the referendum reached ‘il quorum<\/strong>‘, meaning that the minimum number of voters required for the referendum results to be declared valid (fixed by the Italian Constitution at 50 percent of the voters plus one) was surpassed. A massive 57 percent of the total voting population turned out to vote, one of the highest percentages ever reached in the history of referendums here in Italy. Of this 57 percent, nearly 95 percent voted S\u00cc all’abrogazione dell’energia nucleare, della privatizzazione dell’acqua, e del legittimo impedimento <\/strong>(YES to the repeal of nuclear energy, the privatization of water, and the law of legitimate impediment). This democratic result means that the maggioranza assoluta<\/strong> (absolute majority) of the Italian population feels very strongly about these issues and is clearly against them.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

On the 12th and 13th of June the Italian people were called to vote in a popular referendum which required them to make decisions about three important issues: 1. Energia Nucleare (Nuclear Energy). In a previous referendum held in 1987 following the Chernobyl disaster, Italians voted to shut down our three existing nuclear plants, and…<\/p>\n

Continue Reading<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"author":19,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"content-type":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[58874,58873,58875,58876],"class_list":["post-765","post","type-post","status-publish","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-energia-nucleare","tag-legittimo-impedimento","tag-privatizzazione-dellacqua","tag-referendum-giugno-2011"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/19"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=765"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":841,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/765\/revisions\/841"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=765"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=765"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.transparent.com\/italian\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=765"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}