Ask Pato!

In the tragedies of immigration, faces, never numbers...

There is an image that says more than many words. An elderly man, a Pope, shaking hands with a young man with a tear-stained face. «I cried and prayed for your wife and your daughter», whispers Francesco. «Our Christ is close to us, there is no need to go looking for him far away. He is in every person who suffers these injustices." Listening to Mbengue was Nybilo Crepin, known to all as Pato, originally from Cameroon, husband and father of Fati Dosso and Marie, who died of starvation in the desert between Libya and Tunisia. What remains of them is a photograph that has traveled around the world and will make history: a woman and her child united in an eternal embrace, a glimpse of the reality experienced by millions of people on the inhumane immigration routes.

Pato today is a destroyed man, who also arrived in Italy on a boat after five attempts. Interviewed by journalist Marco Damilano, he gave voice to a valuable point of view that he deserves to be heard.

«Today I feel a sense of peace, but there are tears inside me because I achieved my goal alone, while we had planned the project for three people, for the whole family. We had a dream to realize, a future to build and all we needed to do was cross this sea. But life decided differently for us, before embarking I prayed, I prayed to my wife and my daughter."

And again: «This status of illegal migrant makes me uncomfortable because we are only looking for a better future. We didn't do anything wrong. In our countries there are unfavorable living conditions and we want to save ourselves. Nothing can stop you from dreaming, because Libya is not a country where you can stay and live. As long as there are boats, the sea, the waves, migrants will try to cross it. I lost my family, and I saw many people die at sea, many of my companions who drowned before my eyes. When I look to the right I see the sea, Libya. If I turn my head to the left I see the beauty of Italy. And it makes me understand that nothing can stop us from dreaming, nothing can stop us from having a dream. This sea, this sea has stolen my life, many years of my life. But in the end I look to the left and smile."

It's incredible how far the hope of changing, of starting over, of rebuilding a future can go. It seems like a category alien to our way of thinking, of seeing reality, of planning. Another world that public opinion and the political class would like to see inhabited by numbers, by cold accounting, by cheap solutions, without nuances, with basic and ultra-simplified answers, but precisely for this reason impossible.

The reality is the opposite. It's another world yes, but full of faces, stories, people. Of feelings, of projects, of impulses and efforts, of conquests and defeats, of joys and many sorrows, of legitimate searches and struggles for happiness. Even at the cost of enormous sacrifices. Exactly as happens for every man and woman condemned to precariousness.

Goodism? Invitation to build a world without rules? To make feelings prevail over politics? Far from it. Rather, the urgency to reflect, to put ourselves in the shoes of others, to take responsibility for concrete choices and measures, not before having grasped all the faces of a phenomenon, the flesh and blood. It's not difficult, all it takes is an effort: ask Pato!

Matteo Spicuglia

NP Dicembre 2023