Italy is fresh from Jannik Sinner's triumph at the Australian Open and perhaps sometimes forgets that in addition to the South Tyrolean tennis player it can also boast a great boomerang champion. He sits in the Senate and is the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Infrastructure and Transport Matteo Salvini.
In fact, the Lega Nord leader never misses an opportunity to publicly remind us what a modest politician he is, saying and doing things that punctually backfire on him. A bit of a loser protagonist of an American sit-com, a bit of a work colleague who thinks he is very clever and tries to get ahead, but is not so clever.
The cases of boomerangs in which Salvini has featured are numerous and in their own way ironic. The latest involved the well-known Rummo pasta factory in Benevento.
Pasta Rummo
Long engaged in his crusade against insects and cultured meat - even though he is paid every day to deal with something else - Salvini visited the company in January, extolling Italian pasta against the monstrosities that Europe would like to put on the table.
“The smell does not get to you, however, in the face of those who want flour made from insects, worms, crickets and grasshoppers, those who fight the Mediterranean diet in Brussels. Long live our pasta!" the minister said in a video from the pasta factory posted on his social channels.
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However, the clip appeared so specious that a wave of indignation was unleashed against Rummo, guilty of giving Salvini space. Many, missing the target of their criticism, urged people to boycott the pasta and not to buy it at the supermarket. An outcome that created no small embarrassment for the anti-cricket minister.
Zone 30
Paladin of all freedoms, including the freedom to drive in the city center, Salvini immediately shouted scandal at the news of the introduction of the 30 kilometres per hour limit in some areas of Bologna, announcing a directive to limit this drift throughout Italy.
As in the famous scene from Scary Movie 3 (“Call me the president”, “You are the president”), he was rightly pointed out, however, that the initiative to lower the speed limit from 50 to 30 kilometres was promoted and financed with 13 million euro by the very ministry he leads with a law that will come into force in 2023.
What has changed? The approach of the European elections, of course, as well as a sometimes fickle memory. In any case, another “stop” for Salvini.
Bridge over the Straits
Further back in time, in a Facebook live in August 2023, talking about one of his recent fixations, the bridge over the Stretto, Salvini showed the cover of a 1982 issue of Topolino that featured a story entitled Uncle Scrooge and the Messina Bridge. The minister's thesis was that the bridge, even then, was considered a fundamental infrastructure that can no longer be postponed.
Too bad the bridge doesn't even hold up in the story and is eventually dismantled, as you discover if you leaf through the comic strip.
Poland-gate
He has collected countless boomerangs in his many years of political and media career, but the mother of all blunders was in Poland in March 2022, where he had gone to assess the situation of Ukrainian refugees fleeing after the Russian invasion at the end of February.
The visit did not please the mayor of the border town of Przemysl, who blatantly reminded the Lega leader of his past appreciation for Vladimir Putin by giving him a T-shirt with the Russian president's face and the inscription “Russian Army”, the same one Salvini wore years earlier during a sortie to Moscow.
Invited to condemn Putin before going to the border and covered with insults from a group of Italians who were there, he left in a hurry with his tail between his legs. Coming back like a boomerang.
Illustration by Gloria Dozio - Acrimònia Dozio
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