The Maffia

A sprightly young political movement (resurgent Sicilian separatism) and one of Italy's most venerable criminal corporations (the Maffia) had got together to stir up trouble in Sicily for Premier Ivanoe Bonomi's somewhat rachitic Government. Always the separatists had had to make their trouble against odds. The Maffia was a powerful ally.

Some 15 years ago Benito Mussolini tried and failed to destroy the Maffia. He jailed its leaders in cages, marched them in chain gangs through the streets. But at last he had to concede: "The struggle against the Maffia will cease, not when the Maffia has ceased to exist, but when all memory of the Maffia has vanished from the minds of Sicilians." Last week the Maffia was making new memories which might keep Sicily in turmoil for some time to come. The Maffia had seldom had more volcanic soil to work in.

After a year and a half of liberation, Sicilians were half-starved, wretched, rebellious. The Allies' swift but grueling Sicily campaign had razed many of its towns and villages, reduced its food supplies to a bare existence point. What grain they had been able to grow, the profit-minded Sicilians had sold to the Roman market at handsome prices. Hunger and discomfort (shoes cost from $70 to $100 a pair) had fed the fires of rebellion and separatism. Separatist leaders, like the politician Andrea Finocchiaro-Aprile, had kept them stoked. When they died down a little, the Italian Government's efforts to create an army rekindled them. Sicilian students called to the colors had repeatedly rioted. Scores had been killed and wounded in clashes with the carabinieri.

Separatists claim a membership of 30,000 in their party. They claimed 20 times that number of followers. Among these New York Times Correspondent Herbert Matthews last week found the Maffia "deeply involved." The separatists claim that Sicily would be better off if free of Rome's remote control. The Maffia favors freedom too--to carry on its own peculiar stiletto justice.

Last week the harassed Bonomi Government was reported to be pondering a plan for Sicilian autonomy.

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