It's the sign of the times. A dark heap of salt stands out on the horizon, as if the white of history had stopped moving along the banks of the great lagoon. A mechanical arm of an excavator scrapes the guard channels. The flamingos, always pink, sail from Molentargius to Santa Gilla. For the rest, here, in what was the most visionary environmental and economic revolution of a swamp transformed into a salt factory, everything seems to have stopped. Silence has descended like a guillotine on an oasis pierced by economic interests to the detriment of environmental ones. Here, as often happens in Sardinia, the state bodies made money, shovelfuls, scraped the bottom, and then, they ran away. For years, the "chemical-physical characterization" of the entire salt pan area has been invoked, ie the analysis of groundwater and substances that may have altered the subsoil over time and beyond. Nothing is known about it, as if the taboo of possible pollution had severed the vocal cords of those who have the duty to harness past and present misdeeds.

“official” gates

Many, over the years, have crossed the "official" gates of those salt pans concocted in front of Giorgino by a visionary engineer like Luigi Conti Vecchi, capable of transforming a receptacle of malarial mosquitoes into an oasis of salt and work. Service flashing lights and those of the police entered, once to escort heavy loads, the other to seize documents and ascertain possible pollution. Yet nobody talks about the state of health of this salt flat, as if that strip of land torn from the ancient swamp were confined to a treasure chest of secrets and mysteries. The narratives of those who worked there in the past, however, go far beyond those methodically recorded accesses from that entrance cage. There are those roads marked only by tall grass inside the "militarized" border, complete with networks and cameras, which mark the counterbalance between the industrial plant, the chlor-soda plant, and the management of the salt marshes. Just look at those spots on the border from above to realize that if the grass doesn't grow there must be a reason.

Total constraint

Now, those salt pans, a hundred and more years of history since that royal decree of 1921 which assigned the concession to the father who created them, become a real "monument" complete with a decree and State bond. The Superintendence has decided to put the seal of history on what can rightfully be considered one of the most important wetlands in Europe which, with its 2,700 hectares, has marked the salty triangle between Cagliari, Capoterra and Assemini. The decree is in the records: "The site called the Conti Vecchi Saline real estate complex, better identified in the premises and described in the annexes, is declared to be of particularly important cultural interest pursuant to the Urbani code". The effects of a law do not need many explanations when, in record time, that ministerial provision is challenged before the Sardinia Tar. When the upper floors of Piazza del Carmine, seat of the Regional Administrative Court, register the payment of the unified contribution of appeal 253 of 2023, it is May 5, the day after the return of the Saint.

The clash between unknowns

The sender is unknown, the judicial procedures for the moment keep the appellant covered, i.e. the subject who has decided to unleash the war against the constraints imposed by the State on the eve of S.Efis on the entire area of the salt pans, a gigantic compendium, where to move a nail from now on it will be necessary to ask for authorization from the ministerial offices, in particular those of the Superintendency of Sardinia. Moreover, the decision of the area constraint is difficult to contest in terms of substance and merit. Anyone who knows the buildings, buildings, building-architectural project of that extraordinary intervention on Santa Gilla wonders how it was possible to wait so long to protect that now centuries-old heritage. In reality, the binding intervention comes late precisely because of the historical references of the Superintendence officials themselves who speak openly of a real and proper archaeological site "hidden" on that side of the coast, starting from the Punic settlements lying on the salt pans. Prehistoric communities, including Nuragic stations, identified in the territories of Elmas, Assemini and Capoterra.

Villages and plants

The provision is articulated and embraces the entire «real estate complex called Saline Conti Vecchi, including the plants dedicated to the extraction of salt, the reclamation of the vast area of wetlands for the creation of the salt pools and the related infrastructures as well as the urban layout and building comprising the headquarters of the Management, the offices and the village called Macchiareddu, where the residences of the Company's employees and technicians were located». It is an "environmental and engineering oasis which represents - according to the Superintendency - one of the most important testimonies of the historic mining of sea salt, a natural resource that has been the engine of the island's economic, social and infrastructural modernization process" . There is almost everything in the bond decree, including the signs of that judicial war that threatens to unleash itself on the future of that compendium. Obviously all described and narrated with the tact of state officials, but without giving in one millimeter to the binding plan dropped out of the blue on that proscenium all flamingos and salt.

The first fight

To open the disputes of the "decision-making" process is the "landlord" of the entire Machiareddu area, or rather the subject that has the institutional governance of the territory: the Cacip, the provincial industrial consortium of Cagliari. When he wrote to the Superintendency to stop the imposition of the prohibitions it was on the eve of the last Christmas, December 21, 2022. The Consortium's observations are limited, with a punctual reference to that loudly "trumpeted" road that he should have crossed, complete with a cycle path, a stretch of the salt pans. Fai, the Italian environmental fund that was the first to transform the salt pans into a successful tourist-archaeological oasis, would have acted as the "snitch".

Constraints full speed ahead

The Superintendence, despite the project of the industrial body, has not, however, lost heart. The answer is at the tip of a pen, with the firmness of one who has already made up his mind: «reaffirming the importance of the protection action initiated, a partial modification is requested to the project in progress and, at the same time, the partial recovery of the works for those parts considered not incident with the protection and conservation of the cultural values of the real estate compendium". The green light clause is put in black and white: change the project and resume the construction site only in the parts that do not affect the constraint. The decree itself confesses Fai's support for the state decision: «The Fondo Ambiente Italiano - which, in supporting the Superintendency's initiative, has highlighted the multiple aspects of historical, architectural, environmental and landscape significance of the compendium real estate worthy of protection". The decree is now "law" in that white-red expanse at the gates of Cagliari.

The war on the Tar

However, not everything seems to be going smoothly. For the moment, only the Ministry of Culture knows who has declared war on those constraints. No one has come forward publicly. The appeal is pending the setting of a hearing to settle an unprecedented dispute over the future of those 2,700 hectares of salt fields. Certainly behind that judicial challenge there may be either a public body, the Cacip, or the Sicilians of Italkali themselves who have liquidated the top management of ENI in recent months. The clash on the salt pans of Santa Gilla is only just beginning. In the background a major environmental issue, between salt production and new constraints.

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