He was a clerk at a shoe company, though he hadn’t worked for some time. She was a retired artisan. Together, they had no more than 500 euros a month, from her pension, to live off of.
On Friday, they were dead.
In Italy, a country in a deep economic malaise and political disarray, there’s no shortage of people struggling nowadays. Even then, the suicides of Romeo Dionisi, 62, and Anna Maria Sopranzi, 68, struck a nerve — triggering an outpouring of disbelief and sorrow not only in their seaside eastern Italian community, but around the nation.
“The tragedy of Civitanova Marche leaves (me) shocked and speechless,” said Pier Luigi Bersani, leader of the center-left Democratic Party that narrowly won the most votes in February’s election. “We all have to convince ourselves that, out of the spotlight, there is a real and dramatic social emergency.”
Dionisi and Sopranzi lived in an apartment in the same building as Ivo Costamagna, the president of Civitanova Marche’s municipal council, according to the state-run ANSA news agency.
Costamagna had spoken with the couple and invited them to talk to social service workers. But they said they would not, ANSA reports, because they were ashamed about their inability to keep up financially.
“They couldn’t even pay the rent,” neighbors said.
Their garage door open, the couple had left a note asking forgiveness and directing people to a room in the back of their building, ANSA reported. That is where they were found, having hung themselves.
Police told reporters there was “no doubt” Dionisi and Sopranzi committed suicide out of desperation.
Adding to the tragedy, Sopranzi’s elderly brother threw himself into the Adriatic Sea soon after the news broke about his sister. He was recovered, ANSA said, but attempts to revive him failed.
As Italy’s economy continues to stagger, suicide rates have increased in recent years, according to the state news agency.
The nation is in its longest recession in 20 years. Its economy — Europe’s third-largest, saddled with a government debt the Treasury Ministry puts at $2.6 trillion — shrank by 0.9% in the fourth quarter of 2012, Eurobarometer says.
Efforts to corral Italy’s government debt through cutbacks have taken a toll. Dionisi, for instance, was among the thousands of esodati — or “exiled ones” — who’d been left without a pension after the Italian government raised the retirement age 16 months ago.
Political instability in the south European country has compounded the economic woes. Bersani has been unable to form a coalition government, leaving Italy in a limbo that prompted international ratings agency Fitch downgrade its credit rating from A- to BBB+.
The suicides Friday echoed the price this malaise has taken on Italian citizens. Laura Boldrini, the speaker of Italy’s lower house of parliament, said on her website that the married couple’s deaths illustrate “the despair of many, due to the shame of poverty.”
The deaths struck closest to home in Civitanova Marche. Mayor Tommaso Claudio Corvatta declared Saturday a day of mourning for the three apparent suicide victims, saying on his website their deaths are impacting “the community in a time of particular economic and social difficulties.”
Antonella Sgavo, a city official in Civitanova Marche, told ANSA that the stories of those three killed are not unique. For that reason, she said, it is crucial that the community keep their eyes open to such everyday struggles and reach out to those in need.
“We need to pay, more than ever, … greater attention to new forms of poverty that affect many families (living) next door, when we do not realize it,” said Sgavo.
Culled from CNN.com
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