The environmentalist lobby has succeeded in forcing a first delay for building the Messina Bridge from the European mainland to Sicily, whose construction was supposed to begin this Summer. The government commission for the so-called “Assessment of Environmental Impact” (VIA) has denied approval, and presented a request for 155 additional “supplementations” to the executive project. The Stretto di Messina SpA, the company that has been assigned the task of designing, building and managing the bridge, is now forced to delay construction by six months in order to provide the required clarifications.
The paradox of one part of the government blocking another part is that the permanent bureaucracy is dominated by officials appointed by the green-liberal lobby in past decades and has the ability to block infrastructure investments and sabotage government policies. The head of the VIA Commission is Giusy Caminiti, a lawyer who has headed the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) in the Lombardy region. It is an evident conflict of interest, as if a conscientious objector were appointed the task of selecting soldiers to go into war.
