Candidates for Pd secretary deny ruling class: “New faces”

It is the ruling class of the PD that ends up in the dock during the first confrontation between the four candidates for the secretary of the dem. The day after the assembly that approved the Manifesto of values ​​and started the congress, Stefano Bonaccini, Gianni Cuperlo, Paola De Micheli and Elly Schlein are at “Mezz’ora in più”, guests of Lucia Annunziata. No one dusts off terms like “scrap” or “flame-thrower”, dear to Renzi’s season, but everyone is committed to a clear change of course in choosing the protagonists who will be sitting in the control room from February 26th . «I’m here because I’ve noticed a rush to enlist after “interesting” candidacies on the part of those who spent all seasons saying everything and the opposite of everything – begins Cuperlo – I would like a comparison of truths between us that leaves behind this pathology which is transformation.” “I ran for office without ever having been on the management team. We changed the ruling class”, echoes Schlein, who is not very fond of the debate about changing the name of the party: “It is not essential to change the name if we do not change faces, methods and if there is no comprehensible vision. We need a clear discontinuity. It cannot always be the same interpreters making a credible break with the past».

Even Bonaccini agrees: “There is a ruling class, more or less always the same, which needs to be changed. We shouldn’t apologize if we ask those who were leaders, without ever letting us win, to sit on the bench ». For De Micheli, who recalls having sided with Cuperlo against Renzi and then leading Zingaretti’s motion, turnover risks not being enough: “We need a party that has affiliates, militants and that spreads ideas. It’s right to change the ruling class but it’s not enough, we’ve done it 9 times and it wasn’t enough. It is necessary to change the party model, in the Democratic Party only five decide”.