A-Infos (en) Italy, FAI, Umanita Nova #12-26 - Between sheet metal and cardboard. Torretta Antonacci: dying of mud and abandonment (ca, de, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

In Torretta Antonacci, in the countryside of San Severo, people continue 
to die. Not by fate, not by chance, but within a system that has for 
years bred exploitation, precariousness, and abandonment. Alagie Singath 
turned 29 on April 2nd. He had lived in the Torretta Antonacci 
shantytown for five years. Five years spent working in the fields of 
Foggia and waiting for a residence permit that never arrived. Five years 
spent between sheet metal and cardboard, in conditions that no society 
that calls itself civilized should tolerate. He was found hanged in his 
shack. A suicide, they say. But it's difficult to talk about individual 
choice when a life is suspended for years amid exploited labor, denied 
rights, and a total lack of prospects.

His death comes in a context already marked by violence and abandonment. 
Just two weeks earlier, in the same ghetto, a man had been killed by 
hammer blows during a dispute. Then came the bad weather: heavy rains 
transformed the area into a mudflat, submerging shacks and making the 
only access road impassable. Hundreds of people were left isolated, 
without help, with no escape route.

We don't know if there's a direct link between the flood and Alagie's 
actions. But we do know that the context is the same: a fragile 
existence, exposed to everything, where it takes very little for the 
situation to escalate.

During the same days, in the countryside of Manfredonia, a young 
farmhand was trapped in his car during the Cervaro River flood. He was 
rescued by the Carabinieri. A story with a happy ending, but one that 
speaks volumes: to be saved, you need to be seen, intercepted, and 
rescued. In ghettos, this rarely happens.

In Torretta Antonacci, none of this is new. The living conditions have 
been known for years. There has long been talk of funds allocated to 
eliminate informal settlements, but they have never actually been used. 
Complaints, promises, and technical discussions follow one another. But 
the shacks remain, and with them the precariousness.

We are not facing an emergency, but a model. An agricultural system that 
relies on migrant labor, flexible and vulnerable to blackmail. A system 
that passes the costs of living onto workers: housing, security, 
healthcare. A system that requires invisibility to function.

In this context, legal precariousness is crucial. Without documents, 
there is no access to regular work. Without residency, there are no 
services, healthcare, or rights. Life remains suspended, always on the 
verge of collapse.

When you freeze to death in winter, or die in the mud during a flood, or 
in the solitude of a shack, these are not separate events. They are 
different expressions of the same mechanism.

In Torretta Antonacci, the mud will dry. The shacks will be rebuilt. The 
laborers will return to the fields. And everything will continue as before.

The question is not what happened. The question is why we continue to 
accept it.

Totò Caggese

https://umanitanova.org/tra-lamiere-e-cartone-torretta-antonacci-morire-di-fango-e-di-abbandono/
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