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Venice is a world
heritage. It belongs to all of us. We must work together to ensure that
this cultural heritage is preserved. As it’s the case with Notre Dame. As it’s
the case with the Amazon. Neglecting the democratic multilateralism and
entrusting the governance of our common destiny to only a few countries -in
fact, to one sole country- is another huge mistake of the prevailing
plutocratic system.
I must insist once more that we cannot tolerate that 4,000
million dollars be invested per day in military expenses and in the weapon
industry while thousands of people are dying from hunger and extreme poverty,
most of them girls and boys ranging from one to five years old. There is an
ever-increasing, unquenchable need for funds allocated to territorial
defence... But is there anything left for the inhabitants of these territories?
What are the resources allocated to ensuring a dignified life in areas that are
overprotected by means of increasingly efficient and expensive war devices?
What technologies are being developed to cope with natural disasters, fire,
floods, earthquakes...?
Mankind is still lacking access to the five priorities
established by United Nations -food, water, healthcare, environment care and
education- and we have not yet the ability to prevent and to address global
threats. With Barack Obama as President of the USA, in the fall of 2015 there
was a reason for hope: although the advice of scientists concerning ecological
deterioration and the irreversible nature of some of the processes had been
ignored for years, Obama finally succeeded in triggering a response from the
keenest observers and having them sign -within a multilateral frame- the
Paris Agreements on Climate Change and the Resolution adopted by the UN General
Assembly on the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aimed
at “Transforming our World”. Everything seemed to indicate that the extremely
serious situations resulting from the action of irresponsible political leaders
would at last be addressed.
But hope quickly vanished: as could be expected given
the well known hostility of the Republican Party of the United States toward
multilateralism, the election of Donald Trump as President of the USA led to a
demand, immediately accepted by the G7, of more funds being allocated to
defence, and the announcement that the SDGs and the urgent agreements on
climate change would not be put into practice... And this serious offence
committed by the implausible President of the USA against humanity as a whole
did not give rise to any institutional or personal reply!
I’m referring to the above to make it clear to us all
that rescuing Venice is part of the change of direction we must make without
delay at a planetary scale. A great popular clamour -both in the streets and in
the cyberspace- is now urgent if we want to promote a new concept of security
allowing to address the above mentioned priorities, and thus to ensure a
dignified life for all human beings, and a resolution of all conflicts - within
a multilateral frame- through word and not force.
For the first time in history we are confronted with
an imminent case of intergenerational responsibility because -due to the above
mentioned irreversibility of some processes- the habitability of the Earth as a
whole could be affected and the historic mistake of not having been able to
avoid this consequence could fall upon current generations.
Venice is drowning... And at the same time the sea
level is rising. Many centuries ago the course of rivers was altered and walls
and big dams were built. More than three decades ago -I remember the actions
taken by UNESCO in the nineties- a very interesting hydrological study was made
to assess if the “high waters” could be held with 78 mobile dams or floodgates
suitably located at the entrances of Venice lagoon... The MOSE (Experimental
Electromechanical Module designed in the late eighties) was upgraded and it
looked as though its implementation would be a suitable solution for the
preservation of the “aquatic city”. Once more large sums were invested in
bombers and rockets to the great satisfaction of big corporations of the war
industry, while the implementation and efficient operation of the dams that
could “isolate” the lagoon of the Adriatic Sea was delayed. The construction of
the system of floodgates finally started in 2003 and it should have been
operational by 2016.
35 million tourists every year! Everybody should visit
-either personally or through the media- and enjoy the City of Canals, one of
the most incredible World Cultural Heritage Sites. The neoliberal drift is
coupled with a greater social gap, force as the only rationale and a
progressive deterioration of the Earth’s habitability, the reason for the later
being that, for the first time in the history of mankind, many of the features
that are typical of our current way of life have an ecological impact. It is
absolutely unacceptable that, despite the fundamental agreements that were
reached in 2015 concerning the Climate Change, The Republican President Donald
Trump still continues to set the pace of life in the whole Planet without
anyone opposing his plans. Up to now. Venice, the Amazon, California fires...
these could be the triggers for a popular reaction. The time has come for “We,
the peoples”. The time has come to cease being mere spectators and to become
the actors of our own destiny.
