Mural depicting star volleyball player Paola Egonu defaced, government denounces “vulgar racism”

A mural, inaugurated Monday in Rome in honor of the very recent Olympic volleyball champion, was vandalized a few hours later. This racist act targeting the 25-year-old star player is far from being the first.

The Italian women’s volleyball team won gold for the first time in its history at the Paris Olympics on Sunday, August 11. Italy would not have been able to win this title without Paola Egonu, the match’s top scorer with 22 points. An Italian artist, Laika, decided to pay tribute to the star of the Nazionale, who is regularly the target of racist attacks. She created a fresco, entitled “Italianità” (Italianness) in front of the headquarters of the Italian Olympic Committee (CONI) in Rome, where Paola Egonu was depicted wearing the national team jersey and her gold medal.

And in a volleyball, you could read “Stop racism, hatred, xenophobia”. The artist said in The Gazzetta dello Sport that this victory at the Olympics “is a slap in the face to all the so-called patriots who do not accept a multi-ethnic Italy”. Inaugurated on Monday, August 12, this fresco was vandalized the following night. The player’s black skin was covered with pink spray and the anti-racist inscription on the ball was erased.

This act of vandalism has provoked a torrent of reactions. The artist Laika denounced it on social networks “Racism”, “a cancer from which Italy must be cured”Many Italian politicians have also reacted, like the Minister of Foreign Affairs Antonio Tajani who denounced a “serious gesture of vulgar racism”. For her part, the Minister of Tourism Daniela Santanchè recalled that “all forms of racism must be denounced and fought”.

Paola Egonu, 25, has made the fight against racism one of her battles. Born in northern Italy, near Venice, to parents from Nigeria, she was naturalized at the age of 15. She was selected for the first time in the Italian team when she was not yet 18. The volleyball player then allowed the Nazionale to become vice-world champion in 2018 and European champion three years later. And yet, in 2021, when she was chosen to be the flag bearer for Italy at the Tokyo Olympics, she was the target of racist attacks.

This continued the following year, so much so that in the fall of 2022, after a third place at the World Championships, she took a break from her national team career. After making a service error in the semifinals of these World Championships, she received racist messages on social networks. “I’m constantly asked if I’m Italian.”confides the one who calls herself “tired” from this situation and who is thinking of stopping playing for Italy.

Finally, she stays and in early 2023, in an Italy that has just elected Giorgia Meloni, she even co-hosts the hyper-popular song festival in San Remo, an honor reserved for the big Italian stars. She then delivers a monologue in which she recounts the latent racism she has suffered: “To the question of racism, I answer in the following way: take glasses of different colors and put water in them. You will see that most people will choose the transparent glass simply because it has the clearest contents. But if you try to drink from one of these colored glasses, you will discover that the water always tastes the same, fresh and alive, because we are all the same beyond appearances. [… ] I love Italy. I proudly wear the blue jersey which, for me, is the most beautiful in the world. I have a deep sense of responsibility towards this country in which I place all my hopes for tomorrow.”

A few months later, in the summer of 2023, in a book that was a huge success in bookstores and sparked controversy, a figure in the Italian army, General Vannaci, entered politics. In this book, in which he spoke out against what he considered to be the multiculturalist ideology and denounced by many as openly racist, he considered, with regard to Paola Egonu, that “even if she has Italian nationality, her features do not represent Italianness”.

General Vannacci is now a Member of the European Parliament, elected on the list of Matteo Salvini’s far-right party, the League. He also congratulated the players of the Italian team after their Olympic victory. He even said he was ready to ask her for an autograph, while repeating that her features are not those of the majority of Italians. A racist phrase among many others, to which Paola Egonu has not yet responded. “It’s a dream, don’t wake me up”the player posted on Instagram on Tuesday, with photos of herself all smiles, gold medal in hand.