A day of high tension and risk of paralysis for Italy, grappling with the wave of strikes proclaimed by students to protest against the high cost of living, the cap on foreign students and the degradation of school facilities. Crowded squares from Naples and Turin, where the first clashes with the police took place yesterday. In the South, however, the protest of hauliers over high fuel costs is raging. Blocks planned in Puglia, Campania, Calabria and Sicily. Fridays for Future marches are also underway in dozens of cities. The aim of the mobilization, in this case, is to send a message about the climate emergency witnessed by the extreme heat waves which caused over 30 thousand deaths in Europe this summer.
The student march in Florence ended to protest in particular against school cuts but also against the Valditara Decree on the limit on foreign students in class. The procession started from Piazza San Marco and arrived in Piazza del Carmine. Over 2,000 people were present and chanted against the government and in particular Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. In the final stretch of the procession the participants exploded some firecrackers. Compared to the original route, it was decided not to pass through Piazza Ognissanti and Lungarno Vespucci, which is why the procession went directly to Piazza Goldoni, Via dei Serragli, Ponte alla Carraia, then arriving in Piazza del Carmine. Students from the Galileo, Machiavelli, Castelnuovo, Leonardo da Vinci, Porta Romana and Dante, Marco Polo, Duca d'Aosta, Da Vinci, Agrario high schools were present.
Leopard day of strike in Cagliari and its hinterland for the national mobilization of students and that of teachers, managers and ATA staff proclaimed by the Sisa union. A procession of students adhering to 'No Meloni day', with placards, trumpets and slogans against the government and the Minister of Education Giuseppe Valditara, left around nine o'clock from Piazza Garibaldi and crossed the streets of the city center and arrived in Piazza Yenne, then continued towards Via Roma, where it stopped in front of the Regional Council building.
Shouting "Marshal Tito taught us, killing the fascist is not a crime" a group of students participating in the national school strike promoted by the Alternative Student Opposition (OSA) movement in Genoa placed two silhouettes of the Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and the Minister of Education and Merit Giuseppe Valditara upside down near the rubbish bins and threw eggs at them. The episode, in memory of what happened to Benito Mussolini on 29 April 1945 in Milan in Piazzale Loreto, occurred in Via dei Santi Giacomo Filippo near the headquarters of the Prefecture of Genoa, the Metropolitan City of Genoa and the Regional School Office.
The students took to the streets alongside truck drivers and farmers in their protests against high fuel prices in Trebisacce, one of the places chosen for the implementation of the truck stops which are causing traffic disruption. Students from Trebisacce's high schools are demonstrating in the streets of the town. Between placards, slogans and banners against the high cost of living and the increase in energy costs, the young people, around three hundred, are demonstrating their solidarity with truck drivers and farmers.
Thousands of students gathered this morning in Piazza XVIII Dicembre, in Turin, to take part in "No Meloni Day", a day of mobilization against the war and to ask the government to allocate the economic resources provided for defense to the school. The protest takes place in a climate of strong tension, after the recent acts of vandalism that affected some institutions in the city, leading to the arrest of a 17-year-old and the identification of other young people.
"We are exhausted. Today we are here protesting to shake up the whole country. We are asking the government for a structural reform of the sector, the reduction of fuel costs and tariffs suited to production costs". This is what Domenico Notaro, spokesperson for Calabria for Fedralog, the regional logistics federation which promoted the hauliers' protest against expensive fuel starting today and until October 20th, together with the counterpart federations of Puglia, Sicily and Basilicata, told Adnkronos. Since the early hours of the morning there have been around twenty truck stations active in all the provinces of Calabria.
The protest proclaimed by hauliers and farmers against the high cost of fuel, the increase in management costs and the growth in the cost of living has come to life in Catania and the province. The first traffic disruptions are recorded in the northern industrial area of the Etna capital, in the area of the Ikea entrance, where several heavy vehicles are stopped, creating severe slowdowns. The mobilization puts the spotlight on the growing economic difficulties of companies in the sector, a strategic hub for the logistics and distribution of goods on the island.
