National demonstration
Rome – 8th of February 2’14

Illegal is the law, its cost is real…
On the 15th December in Rome, the network “End of the Prohibitionist World” has launched a national meeting that precedes the ruling of the Constitutional Court on the drug laws named after Mr. Fini and Mr.Giovanardi, scheduled on the 11th of February.
It has been a very intense meeting with many groups ranging from social centres to harm reduction operators,NGO,s and bits of institutional organizations. The eight years of the Law Fini/Giovanardi have produced tens of thousands of arrests, prison overcrowding,exorbitant costs for the repression and judicial machinery, the growth of the drug business of the mafias; too many persecutions and casualties, too many deaths that still reclaim the truth
The two laws on drugs and on migration have provoked a row of proceedings that turned the italian prison condition into an emergency, a national case that puts Italy forth of the european standards
No other european country has so many detainees on drug related charges.The heavy criminalisation of users clashes with the impunity granted by our juridical system to the authors of other crimes whose effects harm the health of the entire society just like if the groups to be identified and prosecuted would be pre-constructed by a process stigmatisation.The European Union , concerning the situation of our penal institutions, has already reproached Italy that is about to be chairing the Council of the European Union with some terrible credentials, being guilty of non respecting some basic human rights.A a matter of fact in little there could be soon some very heavy and well deserved fines sent to Rome!

All this happens since many years under the crooked, distorted and expensive cover of the Anti-drug Policies Department, (DPA),an agency under the Premiership and also the Presidency of the Council instead of the Departments more directly competent of Health, Justice and Social Affairs). The DPA claims, against any evidence,e that in Italy drug users are not punished but cured whereas it obstructs even at the international level the harm reduction policies. It promotes a bio-medical pathological model on drug use that assimilates all substances and all consumption patterns.After the fall of the centre-right government that had dictated the law no one of the following governments has lifted a finger to fix such dramatic situation.
Finally today something seems to be moving…it looks like the system could be stopped.
From January on several tribunals like the Court of Cassation, have suspended the processes and have sent the law to be examined by the Board because of its blatant unconstitutionality. And now we know that the Constitutional Court will discuss the question on the 11th of February .
The main objections that will be under examination concern the procedure of the law making that rather than being discussed in the Parliament, has been approved through a decree regarding another argument( the winter olympic games of Torino in 2006) and without any urgency cause; moreover the equalisation of penalties for hard and soft drugs violates the european norms.
We all have in mind that the possibility that the Constitutional Court would cancel the Fini/Giovanardi Law represents a unique chance that could open a completely new scenery.
Therefore, we think it is necessary to gather all forces, mobilise individuals, groups, activists, patients, structures and organizations, that since many years are fighting for the repeal of this inauspicious law with a big demonstration in Rome on the 8th of February. We want to build up a we consider necessary to gather all forces, mobilise subjects, groups,activists, patients, structures and organizations , that since many. We want to build up a common route from below focussing on the harms caused by the law and that could work as an engine to the decisions of the Constitutional Court.
We ask to all to subscribe and disseminate this manifesto; to organize the mobilisation in territories informing and promoting initiatives to promote fund gathering in support of the participation to the demonstration, many points spotted on one map, where, who will will could find others willing to organise the collective trip to Rome, putting together or renting the transportation means.
We are not anymore willing to pay with our lives and our rights the cost of ideological and repressive laws directed to empower the billion trade of the drug mafias; we are not anymore willing to see the prisons filled up with users that are turned ,according the beloved criminal pathogeny theorem of the prohibitionist propaganda, into individuals considered dangerous for themselves and for the whole community who deserve to be punished and corrected, considered as mentally ill criminals. We are not anymore willing to attend at the persecution also of patients that use cannabis with therapeutical goals.We are any longer willing to let people who in the jails.
The time has come to move towards a full decriminalisation of personal use. Starting with cannabis and its home cultivation like it is already happening in many countries in the world
On the 8th of February we will take the streets in Rome because
Right or wrong it can’t be a crime!
Let’s cultivate the future!
For info and registration adesioni@leggeillegale.org

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