Jerry Masslo
Jerry Essan Masslo, 4 December 1959 – Villa Literno was a South African refugee in Italy, who was murdered by a gang of criminals. His case deeply affected public opinion on racism in Italy and led to a reform of Italian legislation regarding the recognition of refugee status.
The killing of Masslo resulted in the acknowledgement of the need to guarantee adequate rights and duties to immigrants, whose number had grown considerably in the 1980s, reaching 600,000 by 1990 according to some sources; 1,3 million according to others. Shortly after his death, the largest anti-racist demonstration in the country was organized in Rome, attended by 200,000 people. The story of the non-recognition of refugee status to citizens of countries outside Eastern Europe led the government to rapidly issue a decree-law before the end of the year, latter converted into the Martelli Law. The law would function as an amnesty law, and recognize the status of non-European foreigners under the mandate of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and eliminated the 'geographical limitation' for political asylum seekers. Masslo's death is seen as the beginning of a new chapter in multi-ethnic coexistence in Italy.
Early life and immigration
Jerry Masslo was born in 1959 in Umtata, which was between 1976 and 1994 the capital of Transkei, a former bantustan. He lived there in impoverished conditions in a hut made of wood and metal sheets, but yet managed to continue his studies in schools that were 'for blacks only'. Masslo's father died during a black rights demonstration together with Jerry Masslo's 7-year old daughter, who was killed by a stray bullet.Masslo was a politically active student, and was sympathetic to the mass civil rights movement for 'colored' people that opposed apartheid. After the Transkei coup d'état of 1987, Masslo got his wife and two children to escape via Zimbabwe and eventually reached Lusaka where some of his family lived in exile.
Helped by a friend, he traveled clandestinely, together with his younger brother, on a Nigerian cargo ship, hidden in a life boat and eating its emergency rations. When his brother developed a fever, Jerry Masslo left the ship in Port Harcourt to buy medicine, but was unable to rejoin the ship before it continued its journey. He would never see his brother again. After selling his remaining possessions he managed to buy a plane ticket to Rome, where he landed on 21 March, 1988.
Upon arrival in Italy, he immediately applied for political asylum with the security authorities. Under the principle of 'geographic limitation', they were instructed to refuse his request, because under their instructions political asylum could only be requested by citizens of Eastern European countries that were escaping communist regimes. Faced with the refusal, Masslo asked to be put in telephone contact with the Italian headquarters of Amnesty International, who put him in contact with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees. The Interior Ministry decided that he could not be granted asylum because not only was there the geographic restriction, there was also the matter than most of his fellow countrymen faced the same problems, and there was no personal persecution. UNHCR negotiated with the Interior Ministry, and after some weeks in an airport cell, he eventually obtained entry permission with refugee status recognised by the United Nations but not by Italy: however Italy would not force him to return to South Africa.
At 3 May 1988, Masslo was welcomed by the Community of Sant'Egidio at the request of Amnesty in their 'Tent of Abraham' at the via Veneziani in the center of Rome. The organization housed many refugees from various countries, mostly from Africa. He applied there to be expatriated to Canada, indicating his desire to be reunited with his wife and children. The Canadian representation in Rome was willing to his case, but there were many bureaucratic hurdles to overcome. He started to learn Italian and took on occasional jobs, sending any leftover money to his family. In the Summer of 1988, he decided to travel to Villa Literno, close to Naples, where he heard would be opportunities to work in the tomato harvest.
Working at Villa Literno
With Masslo, thousands of immigrants traveled to Villa Literno to look for work, year after year, under harsh conditions. The area at that time mainly earned its income from agriculture, and a predominant role was played by the Casalesi clan of the Camorra. The tomato fields were subsidized by both the Italian government and the European Communities and required during the harvest period a massive use of labor force at low prices, for which farmers were unable to find Italian laborers. This made the region a stop in a migration of immigrants who followed various seasons in agriculture, moving around as work was requested. During harvest season, the town would grow from its usual 10,000 inhabitants with 4,000 immigrants.Each morning, Masslo would join hundreds of immigrants at the crossroads of the village, nicknamed by locals as "piazza degli schiavi" where caporalato
At the end of harvest season, after two months, Masslo moved back to the Tent of Abraham in Rome. His visa for Canada did not arrive, and in the Summer of 1989 he returned to Villa Literno for another harvest season.
This time, there was a growing awareness in the barracks where immigrants would sleep, that they were being exploited - especially as the pay per crate went down from 1000 to 800 lire as there was an over supply of labor. Masslo would attend meetings actively. Immigrants had appealed to the union, but encountered resistance. At the same time, acceptance by the locals was decreasing - and resistance was growing, both lawful and unlawful. Not only were signatures being collected to send the foreigners away, episodes of intolerance were multiplying, and immigrants could no longer walk freely in the city in fear to be beaten up as young men were organizing themselves into squadrons and terrorized the immigrants to stay away from the city center. Some businesses declared themselves 'off limits' to foreigners. The carabinieri found leaflets addressed to the inhabitants of the village, inciting violence against immigrants. The situation was getting the attention of the media, and a Tg2 camera crew interviewed immigrants, including Masslo, about their conditions.
Murder
When the harvest season was nearly over, on the evening of 24 August 1989, Masslo returned to a shed at Via Gallinelle, where he slept with 28 other migrants. A group of thugs raided them, keeping their faces covered, with weapons and bars and demanding money. Because the immigrants were not able to deposit their earnings, they still had most of their 2 months' earnings on them. Some of the migrants would immediately hand over the money, while others refused. Consequently, the thieves struck the 29-year-old Sudanese Ayuel Bol Yansen with the back of a gun. The situation deteriorated and one of the robbers shot his 7.65 caliber pistol three times at Masslo and another worker. The thugs fled in fear of a mass response by the immigrants. The Kenyan Kirago Antony Yrugo survived but Masslo died.The Italian General Confederation of Labour asked for a state funeral for Masslo, which was held on 28 August in the presence of Deputy Prime Minister of Italy Gianni De Michelis and other representatives and media. Tg2 broadcast the funeral live, as well as a quote from Masslo's earlier interview:
After the service, Masslo was buried in an anonymous tomb in the municipal cemetery of Villa Literno.
Three young men were convicted a year later an sentenced to prison sentences of 24.5, 24.5 and 22 years. A fourth killer was a minor at the time of the murder, and was sentenced to twelve years imprisonment. The three admitted to participating in the robbery, but none confessed to shooting him. They claimed that the murder was not racially motivated, but rather intended as a robbery of easy targets.
Reactions and subsequent developments
The death of Masslo reached a wide audience within Italy, with headlines on the front pages of several major newspapers. The national broadcaster TG3 opened the news with "Death squad at Villa Literno shoots black workers." Prominent figures spoke out against the act: the United Nations; Pope John Paul II condemned the murder and called Masslo a "victim of intolerance;" and the President spoke on the matter, as did the whole political spectrum and all trade unions.It was not the first racist incident in the country to make the news: an Ethiopian woman was forced to give up a seat on the bus, and a black man was kicked out of a window by another gang in Naples. On 20 September the same year, a first strike by immigrants was held against the caporalato in service of the Camorra. Masslo's death galvanized a much greater public discussion of immigration and opposition to racism. On 7 October, Italy's largest-yet national demonstration against racism took place in Rome, with 200,000 participants from Italy and abroad. The Speaker of the House Nilde Iotti met with a delegation of immigrants in Villa Literno and in February 1990 the Martelli Law was implemented, a first controversial attempt to tackle immigration issues with the then more than half a million foreigners in their country.
In the subsequent summer, a tent city in Villa Literno called "Village of Solidarity" was built by young people from all over the country, and named after Jerry Masslo. In the following years, despite the media attention, the condition of immigrants in the countryside around Villa Literno did not get adequate support. The difficult sanitary conditions of the settlement in which the laborers lived made it receive the name Ghetto di Villa Literno. The Camorra clans were annoyed by the media attention that Villa Literno continued to collect, and responded in September 1998 by burning the Ghetto - even though there was an intention by the prefecture to find an alternative living situation with an investment of over a billion lire. The bishop of the region characterized the fire of the Ghetto of Villa Literno as the 'burning of the State'.