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There are also people in the European Parliament who are not classic professional politicians. Pietro Bartolo is one of them.
“The session is open,” announced the speaker in the European Parliament. Pietro Bartolo gets up from seat 456. “The next item on the agenda are the statements by the Council and the Commission on the need for a European solution to asylum and migration, including search and rescue.”
Start of a working day in the European Parliament. “Mr. Pietro Bartolo asked for the floor.” The person addressed catches his breath and starts his 28th speech of the current legislature. Speaking time 1 minute and 30 seconds.
Legend:
The European Parliament is made up of 705 professional politicians from 27 countries, elected for five years. They have gathered in seven political families – from the far right to the far left. Pietro Bartolo cannot be squeezed into the well-known scheme.
Getty Images/Roberto Serra
Bartolo is not a politician. He is a doctor, Doctor of Lampedusa. There, where thousands of people stranded on inflatable boats in Europe. The doctor became a politician because he couldn’t do anything else, because of this responsibility on his shoulders.
The sea means everything to Bartolo
The reading glasses almost fall off the tip of his nose. Bartolo tells the story in his bare parliamentary office, on the walls of which the children’s drawings that cheer him up are missing, in his hospital in Lampedusa. On this island surrounded by water.
The sea means everything to him. A fisherman’s son. He almost drowned as a child in the Mediterranean Sea. It’s a miracle he’s still alive. That’s why he became a doctor.
Legend:
Bartolo also became an author, writer, filmmaker. Books, award-winning films. He won the Golden Bear in Berlin and was nominated for an Oscar. Bartolo is popular. No other politician in Italy received more votes in the European elections. Image: Bartolo at the Taormina Film Fest 2018.
Imago/Maurizio Avanzo
“I let myself be elected to break out of this loneliness,” says Bartolo. He took refuge in politics to be heard. «High art, something noble, always with the common good in mind. That’s politics, »says the Italian. Bartolo doesn’t lack credibility, but he does lack influence. Despite conviction, he has not yet achieved anything politically.
Fight for European values
Bartolo believes he is in parliament to change something. Maybe he’ll make it, maybe not. He does it for his granddaughter. One day his granddaughter will want to know why he allowed everything, why he wrote these books. Why filmed films. Why he became a European politician.
“Respect for the dignity of all human beings, human rights, the rule of law. Openness, solidarity – these are the values on which Europe is based,” says Bartolo. “It’s the basis of our culture.”
Europe is jointly responsible for the suffering of the people on all refugee routes.
Article 80 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union. Seated in chair 456 in the European Parliament is the Lampedusa doctor, who received thousands of people in his port and gave them medical care.
Europe’s failure
There sits Pietro Bartolo, who identified thousands of drowned bodies in sacks without being able to name them. Many children, their fathers and mothers. People who dreamed of Europe but never reached Europe alive.
“Europe is jointly responsible for the suffering of the people on all refugee routes,” says Bartolo. The plenum in front of him is almost empty.