A flick of the tail

It was the 9 February 1983: the acrid taste of years of lead, with its load of fallen on both sides, it seemed like a thing of the past, the youth right had made giant strides in overcoming ideological conflicts, part of the left was starting to criticize itself and generational dialogue seemed within reach. Instead, that blow to the back of the head is an unexpected and unpredictable leap backwards. Which, however, will mark a point of no return. Paolo deserves something more than hot revenge, of the tired ritual ofan eye for an eye, tooth for tooth. The answer is that there is no answer, the “favor” will not be returned: in front of Paolo's bloodless body wrapped in a shroud and the white lily donated by a nurse, its "leaders" swear that innocent blood will not be answered with more innocent blood. And so it will be. «With Paolo di Nella, a fighter for his own people died, a national revolutionary. No one dares to offend this martyr with useless hysteria: the only revenge is to continue his fight against the system that murdered him", we read in the Youth Front leaflet written a few hours after his death.”

Long-haired and stubborn

Militant of Youth Front, silent, long hair and glasses, Paolo was a boy very far from the fascist stereotypes of the early 1980s. Paolo worked in silence in the street closet Sumcampagna where he spent hours writing posters by hand, he went on holiday in a tent, he was driving the motorcycle, it was about neighborhood communities beyond the right and the left, he was against the death penalty ( that was enough to kick him out of the MSI section of viale Somalia). Stubborn. He had made up his mind to return the Villa Chigi park to the citizens of his neighborhood to use it as a social and cultural center and had spent much of the day of the attack putting up posters to make public a collection of signatures for the expropriation. That evening on the billboard is only with Daniela Bertani when towards 23, while he is in the middle of the traffic island in Piazza Gondar, he is approached by two boys apparently waiting for the bus and hit in the back of the head. Back in the car, he is accompanied to a small fountain, he rinses the wound and makes Daniela promise that she won't say anything. When he returns home, his parents hear him washing his hair, move restlessly and complain, the ambulance arrives when Paolo is already in a coma.

The uninterrupted vigil

For seven days and seven nights his community doesn't let go of him for a moment. Sitting on the floor in the corridor of PUmberto I hospital dozens of boys and girls are there, to protect him, to caress him, almost as if wanting to resurrect him with vigil and prayer, between cartons of cigarettes, sandwiches and tons of coffee. A sad afternoon, il 5 February, while most of the kids are in the procession and the hospital is semi-deserted, a small miracle takes place: He shows up at Paolo's bedside Sandro Pertini, the partisan president, for the first time an anti-fascist broke the ignoble vulgate according to which "killing a fascist is not a crime" , the visit of the head of state will be followed by that of the communist mayor Ugo Vetere. In the aftermath of Paul's death, Giuliano Ferrara signs an editorial by Republic in which he admits that although Di Nella's political life was "deplorable", respect was owed to the dead man. The family receives a telegram of condolences from Enrico Berlinguer. Something moved, but none of his killers did a single day in prison, the presence of the head of state was not enough for the judiciary to change gear with misdirections and cover-ups of the Autonomia Operaia activists who were very "active" in the African neighborhood, on the border with Trieste Salario. Di Nella's murder went unpunished, as happened with Francesco Cecchin, killed near Piazza Vescovio a few years earlier.

Fake investigations and silence

Five days later a flyer signed Autonomia Operaia was found in which the ambush was claimed. Luca Baldassarre and Corrado Quarra ended up on the list of suspects, who initially managed to escape, then Quarra was stopped months later in Piazza Risorgimento and two days later Daniela Bertani he recognized him as Paul's attacker. Too easy to end up like this. A trap was set for Daniela and, deemed an "unreliable" witness, Quarra was acquitted. It was the 21 April 1986, date on which the investigation was closed. The counter-information dossiers were of no avail, the investigations conducted by friends, the testimonies of the neighborhood, the doubts that emerged during the now well-known broadcast Yellow telephone expressed by the investigating judge who dealt with Quarra's release decree. Paul has not yet received justice. He remains an irreplaceable example for the right, a son of Italy, killed for his social and revolutionary vocation. A 36 years after his death, like every year, his brothers, young and old, they remember him with the present ceremony in front of the "Paolo lives" banner. The hand on the heart and an oath that is renewed.