Election Surprise
The Villalba attack inaugurated a long series of Mafia attacks in Sicily on political activists, trade union leaders and ordinary peasants resisting Mafia rule and claiming land titles. In the following years many left-wing leaders were killed or otherwise attacked. On April 20–21, 1947, the Blocco del popolo – a coalition of the communist PCI and socialist PSI – won a surprise victory in the elections for the Constituent Assembly of the autonomous region of Sicily. The Blocco obtained 29 percent of the vote, while the (Christian Democrat Party) got 20.5% and the Qualunquist-Monarchist bloc came third with 14%.
Li Causi furnished an explanation for the success of the left-wing block:
"For the Communist Party, there is no question of world revolution, but of feeding and democratising the people. We plan no Soviet here. We want the big feudal land holdings redistributed, but we respect all properties below 100 hectares . And that is a good-sized piece of property. We want industry... . We want to put the idle to work. Capital will find all the guarantee it needs."
Read more about this topic: Girolamo Li Causi
Famous quotes containing the words election and/or surprise:
“What a glorious time they must have in that wilderness, far from mankind and election day!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“What we were after now was the old surprise visit. That was a real kick, good for laughs and lashings of the old ultraviolence.”
—Stanley Kubrick (b. 1928)