‘No Meloni Day’: students take to the streets to protest against education policies

This day of high tension is drawing to a close, with thousands of students across Italy joining lorry drivers in their protests. The reason for the demonstrations? The government’s education policies: young people are complaining about the lack of funding for the education sector and the condition of school facilities, which they consider inadequate.

Also under scrutiny is the recent decree-law introducing a 30 per cent cap on the number of foreign pupils in classes. But it’s not just about schools: today’s protest – Friday 16 October – known as ‘No Meloni Day’, is being held alongside the global climate strike organised by the ‘Fridays for Future’ movement.

As is often the case, in some cities the situation has got out of hand and the demonstrations have turned violent. Whilst in Turin students threw – amongst other objects – stones at the police and threatened to ‘bring everything to a standstill with a massive general strike’ on 30 October, whilst in Rome bottles and firecrackers were hurled. In the capital, the march reached the Ministry of Education, where chants of ‘Valditara, get out of the building’ rang out, before firecrackers were thrown at the building. The flags of the United States and Israel were also burnt. A similar scene unfolded in Bologna and in Verona, where twenty-one students, twenty of whom were under-18s, were taken to the police station and will be charged with criminal damage, throwing dangerous objects and blocking the road. The situation remained under control in Milan, however, where several thousand young people took part in the ‘No one is a foreigner’ march, which ended with the occupation of the former mortuary situated behind the State University.

‘“No Meloni Day” has been a success, with over 40 squares across the country and tens of thousands of students marching, just like their French peers. A student movement has emerged, characterised by strikes, occupations and street protests, with simple demands: the withdrawal of the school decree, 13 billion for housing, no reform of technical and vocational education, and an end to the cost of living crisis. ‘Abolish the military-style school system and create a new public school system!’ demanded the Osa Collective, one of the organisers of the protests.”

How did Italian politicians – whose faces had been daubed with red paint and left on the ground, alongside the ‘Leonardo’ company logo – react to the students’ protest? The Minister for Education Valditara described the protests as forms of ‘political hooliganism’: ‘What we have witnessed is not an expression of democratic dissent or a form of legitimate protest, but outright violence that has nothing to do with students’ right to make their voices heard.’ Deputy Prime Minister Matteo Salvini went even further: ‘We have students throwing stones at the police; those are not students. They are criminals and delinquents, which is quite another matter.’ Solidarity for the students, however, came from the President of the Campania Region, Roberto Fico: “Students must always be listened to, and those who protest have demands and needs. State schools must receive funding for new schools, facilities, teachers and better salaries.”