David Sassoli, who died in the early hours of this morning at the age of 65, has been the President of the European Parliament since 2019, a post that was probably taken by surprise by many, the former journalist, who came down to the political arena ten years earlier, with her colors Italian center-left.
The TV presenter has held the presidency of the EP for a number of years after the bargains of the major political forces and governments for the presidencies of the three main European institutions. That of the European Commission was secured by the European People’s Party (right), with Ursula von der Leyen, that of the European Council the Liberals with Charles Michel, that of the EP the Socialists with David Sassoli.
Respect
His nationality, his party – the second component of the Social Democrat group – and his deep knowledge of the institution, having already been vice-president, turned him, at the last minute, into the right person at the right time.
His term, which lasted two and a half years, was burdened by the health crisis. However, the attention he paid to his teleworking teams, the way he organized things by remote voting system, and the fact that he was able to resist French pressure to bring European elected officials back to Strasbourg, were met with great respect for the institution.
In a show of solidarity amid a pandemic, it has placed abandoned EP offices in both Strasbourg and Brussels at the disposal of organizations preparing meals for families in need, and has given the green light to set up test centers for the new coronavirus.
Although he overcame the leukemia he was suffering from, his health was his Achilles heel. An avid smoker and bon vivant, he was admitted to hospital in serious condition in September due to pneumonia, which forced him to leave his duties in the EP for several weeks.
On December 26, he was admitted to hospital again, “due to a serious complication due to a malfunction of his immune system,” according to his spokesman.
Born on May 30, 1956 in Tuscany, David Sassoli chose journalism after studying political science. He began working with newspapers and news agencies before joining RAI, the Italian public broadcaster, in 1992, where he became the main presenter of its first channel.
He decided to enter politics in 2009, when the former mayor of Rome, Walter Veltroni, organized the merger of two parties of the center-left and the left, a plan strongly supported by David Sassoli, and the Democratic Party (PD) was born.
A candidate in the European elections, he was elected with the PD ballot with 400,000 votes, a success that permanently removed him from the small screen and marked the beginning of his political career in the EP.
Failure in Rome
The leader of the PD group in the institution, he tried to get down to the national political scene, participating in the internal party process for the nomination of the party’s candidate for mayor of Rome in 2013 – but saw him won by Ignacio Marino, the later mayor.
Following the failure of the venture, the father of two devoted himself to the European Parliament. He was re-elected in 2014 and became its vice-president, responsible for its budget and Euro-Mediterranean policy.
He claimed to be the father of the “biggest railway reform in the European Union” – the Sassoli-Daixma Act – which was “adopted in 2017 after three years of complicated negotiations” to open up competition in national passenger transport markets.
He said that he would never “give up his career as a journalist”: he still worked for newspapers and magazines, he often wrote articles.
He co-authored in 2013 with Francesco Saverio Romano a book on cabinets during the abduction of Aldo Moro in the spring of 1978.
“Nothing is possible without the people, nothing lasts without the institutions,” he told his colleagues before his election, quoting Jean Monnet, one of the EU’s founders.
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