The Court of Naples has ordered the immediate reinstatement of Maestro Stéphane Lissner to the post of superintendent (and, consequently, also artistic director) of the San Carlo Theater in Naples.
Lissners contract had been terminates according to a decree that allowed no superintendent to have more than seventy years of age, regardless of the date of expiration of current contracts. The governmental move had the only aim to free up the post of theater superintendent for Carlo Fuortes and obtain his resignation as CEO of the Italian Radio and Television RAI.
So, in the words of the Judge: « The revocation ante tempus, with respect to the natural expiration, of Maestro Lissner’s current employment contract having as its object the post of superintendent and artistic director of the San Carlo Theater must be considered illegitimate since his case does not fall within the spectrum of application of the norm. The order adds that, if the provision had been applicable to Maestro Lissner, the requirements for raising a question of constitutional legitimacy of the government’s decree-law existed. »
Stéphane Lissner said: « An act of justice, after months spent in a ‘limbo’ that I did not deserve but, above all, the Teatro San Carlo and the city of Naples did not deserve. Today, the Court of Naples has given the first, fundamental signal of how my dismissal was an illegitimate and ad personam act, lacking those contents of ‘legal civilization’ that must guide any democratic order. I see in this decision an inseparable link with the European dimension of which Italy, Naples and the Teatro San Carlo itself are authentic and constitutive expressions. Now, I am available to carry out my duties together with the extraordinary people who work in the theater. »
