The Corsican Assembly condemns the “excesses of the mafia” on the island.

Corsica is in hand “Mafia excesses”. This claim does not come from the intelligence services’ record, but from a report drawn up by the Corsican Assembly, which met in extraordinary session on Friday 18 November in Ajaccio. At the end of a long day of debate, a majority of elected nationalists accepted the motion. Due to the lack of reference to political violence in the text of the condemnation, the right-wing did not vote for it.

“Session as necessary, as difficult” President of the Assembly Marie-Antoinette Maupertuis emphasized. “It’s difficult because the main theme is about criminal violence, very often death and always fear, he explained. We have gathered to discuss the excesses of the Mafia because yes, in Corsica there is a line that prevents others from flourishing and expressing themselves. » From there to the naming of the mafia and the condemnation of the mafia system, as the Italian regions know, such as Sicily with the Cosa Nostra, Naples with the Camorra or Calabria with the Ndrangheta, is a step that the elected islanders, above all the president Corsican executive, Gilles Simeon, do not want to cross. “Mafia or not? There is no consensus on this term. ” indicated M.^I Maupertuis.

For the third time in its forty-year history, the Corsican Assembly discussed the scourge that – named or not – plagues Corsican society and poisons the island. The last time the island’s elected officials took up the issue was ten years ago, under the chairmanship of communist Dominique Bouchin. There was no talk at the time “Mafia excesses” But an alarming rise in violence and a steady rise in murders.

The “Shadow Side” of Corsica.

The situation has changed in ten years. But not in the sense that Corsican officials intended, both political and administrative. It got worse. About a decade ago, organized crime specialists in Corsica counted at most half a dozen criminal gangs whose activities plagued the island. In a note released this summer, the National Police Directorate now lists the existence of twenty-five organized gangs. They do not all have the same capacity to disturb, but they create a criminogenic climate. To the traditional and feared teams, many of whose members have been killed or are in prison – the heirs or what is left of them, the Aixtian thugs of Brise de mer, the Petit Bar or the robber shepherds of Venzolaska – have now been added. These new bands.