I’ll tell you how and when Craxi helped Napolitano. Boniver speaks
Paola Sacchi's conversation with Margherita Boniver, twice minister, undersecretary for Foreign Affairs, who Napolitano knew well: he was foreign director of the PCI and at the same time she had the same role in Craxi's PSI.
Giorgio Napolitano, a communist, yes, but an improvementist. It took the extraordinary intelligence, the remarkable acumen of Bettino Craxi to make Americans understand certain nuances, still incomprehensible today even to those who pride themselves on understanding politics, that they had to give Napolitano that visa to go to the USA. His contribution was not insignificant in that record of the "Nap", the first communist with a pass overseas. Margherita Boniver, president of the Craxi Foundation , twice minister, undersecretary for Foreign Affairs with Silvio Berlusconi prime minister, remembers that Napolitano knew him well. He was head of foreign affairs for the PCI, while she had the same role in Craxi's PSI. Boniver tells Startmag the lights and shadows of Napolitano that "he was a very authoritative president, but not a courageous politician, as when as president of the Chamber he allowed the Guardia di Finanza to enter Montecitorio, "the height of arrogance towards politics". But, Napolitano recognized "that for Craxi there was unparalleled harshness, essentially he admitted that there was persecution".
President Boniver, sanctifying him is not good, as it is for anyone, but there are certain attacks on social media as if many have only discovered now, in death, that the president emeritus was a communist.
Incredible (smiles ed .). He has always been one and only communist. The fact that he was part of that small group of so-called meliorists certainly did not prevent him from always representing the political line of his party even in so-called complicated moments such as the Soviet invasion of '56. He neither abandoned nor criticized the PCI.
It was the famous democratic centralism that did not allow currents.
Of course, the fact of being a meliorist communist never dissuaded him from following his party's line. He was disciplined in this, even if due to his culture and nature he was pointed out as pro-socialist.
Indeed, he and his companions were branded internally as Craxi's friends, as "traitors", in short.
Craxi's friends called them to be able to fight them better, given that Craxi at the time was already considered the bogeyman of the Italian and international left.
The paradox was that the meliorists had more advanced positions but were then suffocated by centralism.
Exactly. For example, in 1979 when the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in Italy I created a group to pressure and criticize the USSR and in favor of the Afghans, which included the DC, the PLI, the PSDI and the PRI. I went to Botteghe Oscure to ask for their support but we were denied because there was no opposition from the PCI.
Was Napolitano also the most pro-Atlanticist of the PCI?
Certainly. More than Berlinguer. Napolitano, speaking English well, was admitted to all the international forums that mattered, the exclusive ones that took place in Washington or New York, which he was able to participate in because there had been our positive intervention to get him the visa.
Did the PSI and therefore Craxi even intervene to help him?
Evidently the American embassy had asked Bettino for his opinion and he tried to explain what it meant to be a meliorist communist.
Not easy.
Napolitano had certainly made no secret of being a communist.
And, in any case, it would still be simplistic today to dismiss him as just a communist.
He was a very cultured character who spoke fluent English, who naturally expressed his thoughts, which were listened to with great curiosity by interlocutors, including American ones such as Kissinger, who participated in these meetings. I remember one very well. It took place at Camp David, I believe, organized by the IAi of the time. However, he was the first communist to obtain an entry visa.
What exactly did Craxi do?
The American embassy asked Craxi for information and Craxi gave it to him, evidently positive, and then gave him a visa to go to the United States. The Americans had made an exception somewhat on Craxi's advice
Why did he do it?
Craxi did it because he was a reliable interlocutor whom he respected.
Why did Craxi respect the improvisers?
They were a rather small number when the word reformist was regarded with contempt and fear by the PCI. It was a suspicious word. It was an adjective that was used to better insult Craxians. The communists had already started to do it with Matteotti. The word reformist was legitimized many decades after 1921.
What did Craxi appreciate about Napolitano?
He considered him a valid and unprejudiced interlocutor within the PCI where the distributors of personal hatred towards Craxi dominated. I am convinced that Berlinguer died hating Craxi and I have always wondered how a great politician allowed himself to indulge in feelings of this type. Incredible epithets were given to Craxi in the PCI. Here, Napolitano was an authoritative interlocutor, free of this hatred and tribal prejudices. He was highly esteemed in Europe by socialists.
What relationship did you have with him?
I met him many times when there were opportunities to have close positions. He was a person of great culture, balance, great political elegance, very knowledgeable, of great value. Indeed, when I was a member of parliament for Fi I said that I would vote for him as Head of State. Berlusconi was disappointed. He was certainly a President of the Republic of great importance even if we know that the part relating to the end of the Berlusconi government was highly criticized.
Stefania Craxi said that there was his "indeterminacy" as president of the Chamber in defending "the primacy of politics".
Evidently among all his abilities and qualities there was no courage. The Milan Prosecutor's Office sent the Financial Police to Montecitorio to look for the PSI's budget, which was public as it was for everyone. Napolitano unfortunately gave in.
In the letter to Mrs Anna Craxi he denounced the "unparalleled harshness" of the socialist statesman.
It was very important. Put in black and white. As President of the Republic, Napolitano admitted in fact that for Craxi this was a real persecution.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/napolitano-craxi-margherita-boniver/ on Sun, 24 Sep 2023 06:51:17 +0000.