Today I am writing my last column for the Duty. With a heavy heart, of course.
It has been both a huge challenge and a great privilege to occupy this space for over nine years. It’s not easy to throw a bottle overboard every week, to find a fertile idea, something that hasn’t been said yet or, if it has been said, not yet developed in this way. The chronicle is a solitary and perilous exercise, which carries a constant risk of inaccuracy.
The challenge for me has always been to open up elsewhere, to question silences and taboos, to say out loud what others were thinking quietly. I became a journalist 40 years ago precisely in reaction to the “right line”, trumpeted at the time by the Marxist-Leninists, since taken up by all those who believe they have the truth.
I don’t really believe in THE truth. I believe more in debate. Good journalism, it is said, aims for “the best accessible version of the truth”. It’s the best we can do. But, to get there, you have to put all the cards on the table, examine all the evidence. I believe this is the best democracy, and the media that support it, have to offer: the vigorous exchange of ideas, which by definition gives us choice and makes us more free. Nobody is then obliged to think the same thing.
The privilege for me has been to evolve within a highly respected company whose primary mission has always been the circulation of ideas and openness to debate. The duty and I were born to know each other. The marriage was consummated and also rich in lessons. I thank all those who had the taste to read me, the patience to correct me, the benevolence to encourage me.