State broadcaster Rai said Friday
lunchtime it was still waiting to receive a joint statement
from protesting farmers that it has said it will read out during
the televised Sanremo Song Contest underway until Saturday in
the Ligirian riviera resort.
"We are still waiting for the farmers' statement; so many emails
have arrived that we don't know who we can answer: we are
waiting for one to arrive that Amadeus will read on stage," said
the head of the Rai press office Fabrizio Casinelli.
"Rai is willing to bring their problems, difficulties and
requests to the general public, we are ready to do it," he
added.
"When we have (a statement), (host Amadeus) is ready to read
it," continued Casinelli.
"I repeat, we have given ample availability to read the
statement: if the farmers, who have my total solidarity - my
grandfather was a farmer - bring us a joint statement, we are
ready to read it," he concluded.
Earlier on Friday the Alessandria-Asti autonomous farmers'
collective said it had prepared a statement together with the
group Agricultural Redemption from Melegnano (Milan) that would
be read out at the Ariston Theatre hosting the festival.
Both groups have sent farmers and tractors to Sanremo, with
Agricultural Redemption initially hoping it would be allowed on
stage.
However, on Thursday Rai said this was "impossible" and that
Amadeus would read a statement instead.
Farmers in Italy are staging fragmented protests up and down the
country under different groups and banners.
However, the reasons for the protests are all the same and
concern European and Italian agricultural and environmental
policies and general hardship in the sector.
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