By Prensa Latina,
Roma : Thousands of Naples residents protested government policies of conservative Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi on Wednesday, as the first government council is in session in the said southern city.
Issues discussed by the Executive include the garbage crisis in Naples and its surroundings, generated by urban waste piled in the streets for 14 years.
Unemployed people, environmental activists and members of the committees of defense of outlying neighbourhoods are expressing their rejection of policies implemented by more than one administration to find a solution to the conflict.
Fearing riots, authorities implemented tighter security measures than those during the visit of Pope Benedict XVI in October last year, according to some demonstrators.
Berlusconi suggested new areas to create dumping sites, but Naples residents must reach consensus about this, as nobody wants a dumping site near his/her home.
They must be constructed in military areas, according to Massimo Nuvoletti, Deputy Mayor of Marano, located a few miles from one of the largest dumping sites in the province of Campania, the capital of which is Naples.
Nuvoletti said the government will make a decision in this regard without consulting minor mayor’s offices.
Berlusconi appointed Guido Bertolaso, a physician by profession and current director of Civil Protection, as Secretary of State in charge of solving the serious waste crisis, attributed to the politically incompetent regional institutions and to an incomplete, inefficient system of garbage collection, elimination and recycling, a business involving the Neapolitan mafia, or Camorra.
The situation got more difficult by late 2007-early 2008, with over 50,000 tons of waste piled up in the streets of Naples.