Eurallumina, workers protesting on the silo: 'Unlock resources to relaunch factory'. Table at Mimit on 10 December but agitation continues

The wait is over. They barricaded themselves 45 metres above the silo to demand the intervention of the ministry and unblock the procedures for the relaunch of Eurallumina. That is, the company controlled by Russia's Rusal, which produced alumina from bauxite processing at the Portovesme industrial site until 2009, and now has a EUR 300 million relaunch plan, but has to reckon with the blocking of actions and economic resources provided by the sanctioning procedures activated against Russia.

"Notwithstanding the objectives already achieved, the last in order of time being the issuance of the new Dpcm Energia Sardegna, a final, decisive obstacle to the possibility that Rusal and Eurallumina can start the planned investments (more than EUR 300 million) remains to date,' reads a document signed by the delegates of the RSA factory and the workers' assembly. 'The failure to revoke the financial sanctions ordered by the Financial Security Committee against Eurallumina, originating from the well-known affair indirectly traceable to a shareholder of the UC Rusal group.

Not only that, the document goes on to underline that 'the sanctioning measure, notified on 8 May 2023, entailed the entrusting to the Agenzia del Demanio of the custody and management of the plant'. The document also denounces the 'unequal treatment applied to Eurallumina with respect to other European subsidiaries of the same UC Rusal (in Sweden, Germany, Ireland), where the respective governments, while adhering to the sanctioning regime, have chosen to protect companies considered strategic, keeping them operational'.

Then there is another aspect and it concerns the financial management of the plant, which costs about 20 million a year. 'Until September 2025 it has been sustained by the ownership,' the delegates write, 'while the legislation would provide for management, including financial management, by the C.S.F. through the Agenzia del Demanio with ministerial funds. What triggered the protest was the institutions' failure to respond to the company's request to 'obtain certainty on the allocation of the funds necessary for management'. Today, 'given the absolute uncertainty of the picture and the seriousness of the imminent consequences, we deemed it necessary to convene a General Assembly of the workers for today, at the gates of the plant'.

Hence, the decision to activate the physical garrison on silo number 3 at a height of 45 metres and the request to Mimit, CSF and MEF, as well as the Prime Minister's Office, for immediate 'intervention to allocate the funds necessary for Eurallumina's continuity of operations, as required by law, in order to guarantee the payment of utilities, salaries and invoices of subcontractors and ensure the continuation of environmental reclamation such as the extraction and treatment of groundwater'.