“18 years ago I didn’t sign any contract, just a piece of paper written by hand.”
Gianni Maddaloni, a judo master who built a gym in Scampia in 2005 with the aim of allowing the neighborhood's residents to practice sports and getting as many people as possible off the streets, is very worried.
Now, however, the gym's business is at risk of closure due to large sums of money owed to the Municipality of Naples: 380.574,70 euros of unpaid monthly payments relating to rent and/or occupation allowances and 1.900 euros for the monthly rent of the facility.
Gianni Maddaloni will turn 67 in September, the same month the gym will celebrate its 18th birthday. "The Star Judo Club Napoli journey began 18 years ago ," he told Dire, " when the gym was handed over to me without a signed contract: just a handwritten sheet of paper from the company in charge of the work, but the City Council didn't make me sign any kind of contract. Moreover, in those years I never received a bill. And for 13 years, I was able to provide free sports for the residents of the Scampia neighborhood. I thank the City Council, which was then managed by Rosa Russo Iervolino."
Gianni Maddaloni explains that he did everything he thought was right for his neighborhood.
“I turned a municipal property into a common good. At the time there was a feud, criminals killed each other, and together with other associations this real lifeline for young people was born. Until 2018 I had no contact with the administration. Luigi de Magistris also intervened, promising to resolve everything before his mandate expired. We have been receiving this bill for 1.900 euros for four years and, in reality, nothing has been fixed”.
The Star Judo Club Napoli gym affair is now entirely in the hands of the mayor of the Campania capital, Gaetano Manfredi. "I have great faith in him and his entire team. The mayor is a highly educated person. I have an appointment tomorrow with someone he trusts, and I hope the word 'end' will be written next to this matter."
"I ask Mayor Manfredi ," he adds, " to continue to let me do what I'm doing for my people and to help me lift a financial burden I can't bear. I can't afford to pay around €2,000 a month, plus €380,000 in outstanding rent. It's impossible. Besides, my monthly income is around €1.500, and with that I can pay my water, electricity, and gas bills. Those who can afford it—about 70 people out of a total of 150—pay a symbolic €20. All those who can't afford it have free access to the gym, where they take judo, weights, and dance classes. For me, though, it's enough that people are happy, that they're happy to be able to play sports."
"In our area ," Gianni Maddaloni is keen to inform us, " social services call me when there are troubled children. I have contact with the local health authority, the juvenile court, and adult inmates thanks to the UEPE, the supervisory magistrate who sends them to us for re-education. These children, instead of being held in prison, play sports in our gym and are thus re-educated. In 12 years, we have welcomed hundreds of inmates."
Collaboration with schools is also not lacking. "A few days ago, I was entrusted with a boy with a particularly difficult personality, who was prone to temper tantrums. Sports really helped calm him down and made him understand the importance of respecting the rules. We also work with many young children who have no parents or whose fathers are in prison."
The most famous judo master of Scampia, father of champions Pino, gold medalist at the Sydney Olympics in 2000, and Laura, 13-time Italian champion, truly leaves no one behind.
"Since January of this year ," he concludes, "those over 60 have been free to enter our gym. It's a way to encourage these people to exercise, rather than stay home and laze around."
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