The government has challenged a
controversial ordinance by Sicily Governor Nello Musumeci to
close migrant centres on the island amid alleged COVID concerns.
Centre-right Governor Musumeci has been engaging in a tug of war
with Rome since the weekend.
Musumeci claims the regional government has precedence over the
national government in migrant policy.
The government in Rome contends the opposite.
Musumeci said he would forge ahead despite the government's
legal challenge.
"Let no one think that an appeal can stop our dutiful action of
preserving health," he said.
"It's up to us, and no one else.
"And we will go on down this path".
The governor has been backed by the nationalist opposition
League party and criticised by centre-left parties in
government.
League leader Matteo Salvini, who as former interior minister
applied a closed ports policy for NGO migrant rescue ships, said
he would take legal action against the government for abetting
illegal immigration and accused the interior ministry of hiding
figures on migrant landings.
The centrist Italia Viva party, part of the governing coalition,
has filed a suit against Musumeci and Salvini accusing them of
falsely raising alarm and abuse of office, among other things.
Meanwhile the interior ministry came out with the latest migrant
landing figures.
It said that 17,504 landed in Italy from January 1 to August 25,
triple the number that arrived in the same period last year.
On Tuesday Musumeci said the first migrant hotspot in Sicily was
being emptied.
"This morning they started to empty the hotspot at Pozzallo,"
the governor said on Facebook.
Minister for the South Giuseppe Provenzano visited Sicily later
Tuesday and allayed concerns that migrants were driving up COVID
fears.
He urged Musumeci to show "institutional decorum" over the
migrant-COVID issue.
The governor issued an ordinance to clear all the island's
hotspots and migrant reception centres by midnight Tuesday, but
this aim was not achieved.
Several COVID cases have been reported at the hotspot on the
stepping stone island of Lampedusa south of Sicily.
The island's mayor has assured Salvini that all the
COVID-positive migrants there have been isolated in suitable
facilities.
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