The testimony of Albanian
di Martina D'Onofrio
July 21, 2021 - Seeing the world upside down through the eyes of a Comboni missionary with thirty years of experience in the southern hemisphere is the initiative dedicated to students and employees of theUniversità Campus Bio-Medico di Roma which saw the intervention of Father Giulio Albanese (in the photo) within the cycle of seminars "All roads lead from Rome". Prepare for experiences of international cooperation proposed by the University in Tanzania and in Peru in fact it means "having an inner attitude that is not only spiritual but existential to welcome the provocations that come from the South of the world", explained the journalist priest who since the 90s has been reporting on the Italian and international media about social injustices, situations of crisis and belligerence that have affected various African countries for various reasons.
His is a discourse that starts from the cultural complexity represented by a continent – precisely 'Africa' – with 1 billion and 300 million inhabitants and 800 main ethnic groups. "So if we want to talk about cooperation, a process that implies circularity, we must keep in mind that we are facing a cultural challenge, in which we cannot have a 'solidarity' approach but we must do our best to affirm the redemption of peoples deeply affected by inequalities ". The story of life lived in countries such as Kenya, Uganda or Somalia is supported by the data published in Oxfam's annual reports which sanction an ever-growing inequality between rich and poor: just think that 2153 billionaires in the world have a higher income to that of 60% of the population. All of this clashes with the Western view that "We have a poor continent which is actually impoverished – said Albanian. Africa, which continues to be fanaliat the tail end of development, it offers natural resources of all kinds such as uranium, oil but also diamonds, gold, copper and timber. Unfortunately, both before independence and after 'neocolonialism', the black continent has always been a land of conquest, with the highest price paid by the local populations. We must therefore stop feeling like benefactors because what Africa is calling for is recognition and justice".
It is a narrative decentralization that the missionary asks for, necessary to work for the common good and for that sense of justice that Pope Francis well described in the encyclical Fratelli tutti. Themes also related to cultural anthropology and global health that will be explored in annual preparation course for University cooperation activities in the academic year 2021-2022: in the autumn the first two appointments with Corrado Cancedda, Director of the Botswana University Of Pennsylvania Partnership, and Roberto Ridolfi, President of Link 2007.
