Secretary General of Cisl resigns

On 10 April 2006, Savino Pezzotta, Head of Cisl, Italy’s second largest trade union confederation, resigned. The former confederate secretary, Raffaele Bonanni, will succeed Mr Pezzotta.

Secretary General and Head of the Italian Confederation of Workers’ Unions (Confederazione Italiana Sindacati Lavoratori, Cisl), Savino Pezzotta, resigned after six years in office on 10 April 2006, during the Italian parliamentary elections. His decision to resign underlines the independence of Mr Pezzotta and of the confederation from the electoral outcomes.

Background

Mr Pezzotta has been committed to the trade union movement for over 40 years. In 2000, he was elected Secretary General of the Cisl confederation, after winning a majority of 204 out of 218 votes (IT0010165F). Support for Mr Pezzotta was reconfirmed in 2005 during the fifteenth national congress of Cisl (IT0508307F).

Announcing his resignation, Mr Pezzotta thanked all of Cisl’s ‘members, militants, delegates and officers who, during these years which were very difficult for the trade union, supported and helped him in affirming the identity of the confederation as well as the autonomy of the political, strategic and cultural strategy of the confederation’. Mr Pezzotta has also thanked all trade union officers and executives for ‘the work carried out over the past years, the authoritativeness and coherence adopted to manage the difficult periods with which both trade unions and the country were confronted, safeguarding, at the same time, the autonomy and the social representativeness of Cisl’.

New successor appointed

On 19 April 2006, the confederate secretariat, as proposed by the secretary general, scheduled an executive committee meeting. The committee had to ratify Mr Pezzotta’s resignation and call a general council meeting (for 27 April 2006) to appoint a new secretary general. Following an internal consultation, Raffaele Bonanni, then a confederate secretary with Cisl, with responsibility for labour and training policies and for policies concerning the south of Italy, was appointed Secretary General. Also appointed was the new Deputy Secretary General, Pier Paolo Baretta, previously a confederate secretary who, in recent years, was responsible for Cisl’s tax and tariff policies, industrial democracy and pension systems. According to some observers, the reactivation of the role of deputy secretary general, a post which has been inactive for eight years, indicates the greater willingness within Cisl for internal compromise among the different sensitivities and experiences existing within the confederation.

As regards Mr Pezzotta’s future plans, not much is known at this point. Mr Pezzotta expressed interest in national and international social issues, voluntary activities and in the African continent. The former leader will remain involved with the confederation as President of the Ezio Tarantelli Foundation (Fondazione Ezio Tarantellli) and as member of Cisl’s general council. Some observers have also predicted that Mr Pezzotta will consider entering politics, possibly the Ulivo coalition currently under Romano Prodi’s leadership.

Praise for former leader

Following the announcement of his resignation, Mr Pezzotta received messages of appreciation from trade union members and those in other institutions and organisations. Many observers have positively assessed Mr Pezzotta’s decision to resign prior to knowing the outcome of the parliamentary elections. They viewed this as underlining once again the transparency and autonomy of the former leader’s choices from political results, just as the decisions of the Cisl confederation have sometimes been autonomous and even unpopular.

Secretary General of the General Confederation of Italian Labour (Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro, Cgil) Guglielmo Epifani, thanked Mr Pezzotta for ‘the work carried out together even in the most difficult moments’ and wished him well in his future career. He emphasised how important Mr Pezzotta’s values were for the labour movement and for all those working at social level ‘to protect the weakest’. According to Luigi Angeletti, Secretary General of the Union of Italian Workers (Unione Italiana del Lavoro, Uil), Mr Pezzotta was ‘a valuable and respectable companion but also a loyal friend’, who still has much to offer the country.

Luca Cordero di Montezemolo, President of Italy’s main employer association, Confindustria, described him as ‘a loyal and fair interlocutor who always committed himself to affirm with passion the value of rules and of concertation’. Confindustria’s Vice President, Alberto Bombassei, also highlighted Mr Pezzotta’s capacity for ‘interpreting the social and economic scenarios of our times with the willingness of changing the welfare system and expressing the needs of all workers’. He went on to emphasise the former leader’s loyalty, particularly his ability ‘to keep his word, even when running the risk of becoming politically and socially unpopular’.

Expressions of respect and appreciation also came from government institutions. Maurizio Sacconi, Undersecretary to the Minister of Welfare praised the character and work of Mr Pezzotta, despite a very difficult and intense phase of social dialogue characterised by mixed results.

Marta Santi, Cesos