Sandro Bondi

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Sandro Bondi
Sandro Bondi

Incumbent
Assumed office 
17 May 2006
Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi
Preceded by Francesco Rutelli

Born July 23, 1940 (1940-07-23) (age 67)
Fivizzano, Italy
Nationality Italian
Political party Il Popolo della Libertà
Profession Politican
Sandro Bondi? The first time I heard him speak I had a shock. It was at a Forza Italia meeting, and Berlusconi's arrival was not expected. Instead, Berlusconi arrived, actually while Bondi was speaking. Bondi stopped, looked at him, and said "Excuse me, Mr President, if I speak in your presence..." (Vittorio Sgarbi)[1]

Sandro Bondi (born 14 May 1959, Fivizzano) is an Italian politician of the Popolo della Libertà party. He was appointed on 8 May 2008 to be Culture Minister in Silvio Berlusconi's fourth cabinet, and is the present holder of that office.

[edit] Life

He first attended school at Lausanne, where his socialist emmigrant father had settled. The family later returned to Italy and at a young age Sandro joined the Federazione Giovanile Comunista Italiana, soon becoming its secretary in Lunigiana. He gained a laurea in philosophy from the University of Pisa with a dissertation on Leonardo Valazzana, precursor of the Augustinian order and opponent of Girolamo Savonarola.

A Catholic democrat, he campaigned for the Partito Comunista Italiano, and was elected sindaco of Fivizzano in 1990. In 1992 the town council led by him was overturned by the local socialist party, in associazione con la Democrazia Cristiana. Activists already playfully compared him to a "rapanello" or radish: that is, red on the outside but white on the inside. Following these events he left the PCI.

Subsequently getting to know Silvio Berlusconi via the sculptor Pietro Cascella, he became Berlusconi's secretary, collaborator and faithful advisor, so much so that - for Berlusconi's 2001 campaign - he was given the task of quickly coordinating the compilation of Una storia italiana (An Italian Story), a book of photographs on Berlusconi's public and private life, as electoral propaganda for future elections (as used by all Italian families).

Bondi returned the great trust accorded him by Berlusconi by over the years becoming one of his main supporters, publicly proclaiming his devotion and fidelity to him on several occasions[1], as well as in poems he composed and read on television programmes, which were a major target for his critics and for satirists.

In the 2001 general election he was elected to the Chamber of Deputies for Forza Italia in the III circoscrizione (Lombardia 1). In the campaign for the 2005 regional elections he organised the party's communications and was the same year named the party's coordinator. In the 2006 general election he was re-elected to the Chamber, elected from the results of circoscrizione XX (Campania 2). In the meantime he collaborated with Vanity Fair on a poetry page. In summer 2006 he published his latest sayings under the title "Laici e credenti: una fede comune".

In the course of the 2008 general election he participated in hustings in several Italian towns, as well as one in teatro Fenaroli in the city of Lanciano, where he declared that he did not wish to leave Berlusconi alone in government, as had been done in the past, thus leaving an invitation for all to lean on and encourage him. In the 2008 election, he was a Popolo della Libertà candidate for Senate for the Tuscany region, as well as a centre-right candidate for president of the Province of Massa-Carrara. He was elected to the Senate, and he reached the second ballot for the provincial presidency with Osvaldo Angeli (Partito Democratico), which Angeli then won with 55.4% of the vote, against Bondi's 46%.

In 2008 he was made Ministro per i Beni e le Attività Culturali in the Berlusconi IV Cabinet, relinquishing his post as national co-ordinator of Forza Italia to Denis Verdini.

[edit] References

  1. ^ Tribù s.p.a., Gian Antonio Stella, Giangiacomo Feltrinelli Editore, 2005

[edit] External links

  • (Italian) Biography on the Forza Italia website