But is Repubblica making fun of us about Marelli?
La Repubblica controlled by Exor-Elkann publishes a tough article on the sale of Magneti Marelli. Is Molinari's newspaper trying to recover some credibility (by confining the piece to page 17 of an insert) or is it an ass-kicker? Francis Walsingham's letter
Dear director,
what do my eyes see?
The Republic of Maurizio Molinari – or rather: of Exor, through the Gedi Group – which criticizes Stellantis, and therefore the Agnelli-Elkann, for the dismantling of Magneti Marelli?
In this morning's insert in Affari & Finanza , on page 17, there is an intervention by Patrizio Bianchi, long-time economist and former Minister of Education, who criticizes "our inattentive attention" to the Magneti Marelli affair, historic Lombardy car components company, which in 2018 the then Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (not yet, for a short time, Stellantis) sold to the Japanese company CK Holdings, and therefore to the US fund KKR which controls it.
Could the "careless attention" that Bianchi talks about be that of Repubblica ? Because regarding the closure of the Crevalcore site and the crumbling of an important Italian reality, the newspaper directed by Molinari – as Carlo Calenda said well , I give him credit for that – did not hit as hard as it should have, I think: yet we are talking about the second newspaper most widespread and most read Italian; we are talking about the reference newspaper of the left; we are talking about a huge story. Could it be that, just as there are journalists who are more realistic than the king, there are also journalists who are more lamb than the Agnelli?
In his reflection on Affari & Finanza , Bianchi lists the numbers of the decline of the European and Italian automotive industry (1.4 million units produced in 2000 in our country; 400,000 units in 2021) and China's rise in electric vehicles. But above all he says that "having strong production and research facilities in the area committed to the transformation of the automotive industry means today being on the front line of processes of change, which involve the future of the entire industry".
According to Bianchi, it is "very dangerous to be outside the sector which more than any other contributes to the penetration of structural changes in every area of production […] For this reason", he continues, "the risk of closure of Marelli, as well as the feared sale of Comau , they ask us what industrial future lies ahead for our country."
Comau, for those who don't remember, is a Turin-based industrial automation company entirely controlled by the Stellantis automotive group, but not for long: the car manufacturer intends to proceed with the spin-off , as I read a few days ago here on Startmag . We are not talking about a toy company, with all due respect, but about advanced industrial technologies. The Fim-Cisl has asked the government to evaluate the use of golden power to protect Comau. Indeed, if the golden power was used for Pirelli , which makes tires, then…
If we lose Marelli and if we lose Comau, we lose advanced manufacturing capacity in a very important supply chain. Indeed, to put it in the words of the Prodian economist Bianchi, we lose "competence aids that are crucial in such a difficult transition, of which we are not very clear what the end point is".
Dear director, at this point I ask myself: is the choice to host Bianchi's lash a way to guarantee the plurality of voices, or is it just paraculism after so much – guilty – silence?
Best regards,
Francis Walsingham
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/economia/repubblica-bianchi-marelli-lettera-walsingham/ on Mon, 16 Oct 2023 10:27:52 +0000.