“Today there is a great need to be prepared. There can no longer be room for improvisation.” This was the appeal made by Councillor Lorenzo Bugli (PDCS) during the communications session of the Grand and General Council (Consiglio Grande e Generale). At the heart of his remarks was the signing of the Association Agreement with the European Union and the need to change the working method of San Marino’s political class, through more rigorous planning, greater preparation and broader dialogue among political forces.
The full speech by Lorenzo Bugli (PDCS)
I too join in the congratulations for your opening address to the Chamber and for the wishes you extended to us, hoping for a fruitful term, which is essential at this historic moment.
Your Excellencies, in your address you also reminded the Chamber of what must be a pact with citizens, a political pact, an improvement in how we work. Because, as you recalled with that wonderful opening image in your address, San Marino is opening a new chapter in its thousand-year history, and it does so precisely with the image we all saw on Monday: the signing of the Association Agreement with the European Union.
An image that must not be reduced merely to the act of signing, but one that tells a much bigger story. It is an image that recounts a journey of more than twelve years, a journey carried out by four governments and by all the political forces sitting in this Chamber.
An image that on Monday rightly paid tribute to an enormous body of work. Congratulations go to our Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs, Luca Beccari, to the entire diplomatic corps, to all the officials who worked on this, but also to all those parliamentarians who, behind the scenes, always sought — through their contribution within the political forces to which they belong, forces with a broad international and European outlook — to help the country achieve this great goal.
A goal that, as I said, spanned four legislatures and involved every political force. We must therefore also remember and thank all the Secretaries of State for Foreign Affairs who came before, starting with Antonella Mularoni, Pasquale Valentini and Nicola Renzi, who helped advance this important milestone for the Republic of San Marino.
A milestone that, however, as you rightly said, Your Excellencies, in your address, will require a significant change in the approach to political life within the Grand and General Council.
I say this because today we are living through one of the most difficult periods in history. What we see around us, what we read in the newspapers every morning, must give us pause. We live in an increasingly polarized world, more divided, more conflict-ridden, in which political dialogue has become a rarity.
Nowadays we even see images generated by artificial intelligence that bring back figures from the “First Republic” era, almost wishing they could return, precisely because back then the climate was entirely different.
Today everything is confrontation, everything is social media, everything is about likes. Everything seems to have become a constant chase for immediate approval, a method that now shapes the daily vision and approach to political activity.
And this does great harm, because it breaks the pact with citizens, and above all it breaks the pact with those whom citizens are represented by.
This shift, then, must become essential, because Monday marked a turning point that will require a profound transformation on the part of those who currently hold government positions, those who lead the political forces sitting in this Chamber, and the councillors themselves.
All of them are now being asked to change that very method, to remain open to dialogue, to remain open to discussion. Because that journey was made by everyone, and it will require an effort and a process of reflection that must involve everyone — guided, of course, by a majority that must have a clear vision, but with the contribution of all.
This becomes essential precisely to avoid simply reacting to whatever comes to us from Brussels. We must be able, through this new framework, to anticipate the major changes ahead, to understand what vision we want for the country we are building, and where to seize the opportunities that the Association Agreement with the European Union now offers us.
Opportunities we can finally pursue and finally access — something that was previously denied to us.
Because to those who today speak of sovereignty, I would remind them that there is little sovereignty in remaining isolated, while there is a great deal of sovereignty in being part of a large family where one can engage as an equal, where great opportunities can be seized for our fellow citizens, for our young people, but also for all our institutions, which can finally help reshape San Marino through possibilities that until now were out of reach.
This will indeed require structural change. I also look to my friend and colleague, Councillor Filippo Tamagnini, who chairs the Commission for Institutional Reform, because it is essential that this body — as was already set in motion in the previous legislature — become the place where the work and the quality of work within the Grand and General Council and the administration are redesigned.
It is essential to look to that Commission to understand exactly with what timeframe, with what precision, with what regularity — if I may use that word — the work of the Grand and General Council and of our Commissions should be organized.
We must also understand what level of political commitment will be required, because it can no longer be improvised. Today there is a great need to be prepared. There can no longer be room for improvisation.
So the Grand and General Council cannot, paradoxically, continue to be convened for five days one month and ten days the next, depending on the volume of urgent matters requested by one Secretariat of State or another.
There must be well-structured, precisely organized work. This is the shift that the European Union sets before us as a first commitment, and this is the issue we must learn to tackle together, because it concerns, in effect, the very rules of the game that we all take part in.
This has already happened in neighbouring Italy. Think of the PNRR [National Recovery and Resilience Plan], which required a deep transformation of certain Italian public bodies, which had to completely change — thanks also to intervention from Europe — in order to absorb those funds, which have since proven very useful in modernizing many aspects of the Italian administration.
These efforts led to digitalization, to the improvement of many systems and procedures that until recently were not even conceivable.
But this happened precisely because there was that shift, precisely because the European Union said: “Gentlemen, we are willing, but you need to change certain aspects of your public administration.”
And this is exactly what is now being asked of us as well. So the hope — one I draw directly from your address, and which has also recently been the subject of debate in the joint Commissions — is that today we must pause for a moment, be glad, of course, of the goal we have achieved, but then immediately turn the page.
Because the approach we take within this Chamber must change completely. This is what is being asked of us.
This is the hope I take favourably from the words of Their Excellencies, but above all, this is one of the fundamental goals that the great Association Agreement with the European Union now places before us.
