The Femicide Commission is restarting, it will be bicameral. Roccella: “Forward without divisions”, M5s in pole position for presidency

It also involves the other branch of Parliament, and enlists a total of 36 members to be more representative: it is the new version of the commission against femicide and gender-based violence, which restarts after the final approval of the bill for its establishment . The Senate floor unanimously sealed it with 144 votes in favour. Born in 2017 and in its third ‘life’, the commission now becomes bicameral.

FEMINICIDE OBSERVATORY

Twice it was instituted in the Senate. In 2017, under the 17th legislature and the Gentiloni government, she worked for seven months chaired by Francesca Puglisi, then senator of the Democratic Party. In the following legislature, the commission had 20 members led by Valeria Valente, current Dem senator, and worked from 2018 to 2022. Now the “qualitative leap” of the bicameral assembly, as Valente defined it, underlining the importance of having “the Parliament united on a priority issue”.

The new format was arrived at with an amendment voted in the Chamber whereby the commissioners rise to 18 deputies and as many senators (compared to 16 + 16 in the previous text) in proportion to the size of each group. Another novelty – probably intended to ensure maximum representation and continuity of work – is that there is always at least one deputy and at least one senator for each group. The Minister for the Family and Equal Opportunities, Eugenia Roccella, ‘blessed’ the provision in the Chamber and remarked: “Re-establishing the commission is an important step towards objectives of justice towards women that we must pursue and which do not allow divisions “.

In support of the “inclusive principle”, the senator of the Civics of Italy, Michaela Biancofiore, also expressed herself, convinced that “feminicide is not a topic for women or for living rooms, it is a tumor that involves the whole of society”. On the interventions to be made, Maria Stella Gelmini of Iv-Azione highlighted that “too often the State fails to fight feminicides and there are anti-violence centers that are privately financed, unfortunately without structural resources”.

Now the game on the presidency opens. As a bicameral commission, it should by custom be led by an opposition force. Excluding an encore from the Dems, the M5s would be in pole position but the third pole could also aim for it. He will certainly have to take into account the balance of the two Chambers and, following this reasoning, the presidency could go to someone elected in Montecitorio, no longer in Palazzo Madama.

As soon as it is ready, the commission will continue its tasks. First of all, to investigate the real dimensions and causes of femicide and gender-based violence and to monitor the implementation of the Istanbul Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence, as well as any other supranational and international agreement, with particular regard to the so-called ‘Red Code’.

(Source Ansa)