Achille Occhetto, the last secretary of the Italian Communist Party (PCI), has turned 90. He was celebrated Tuesday at Rome’s Tempio di Adriano in an event organized by the parliamentary groups of the Democratic Party (PD) and the Enrico Berlinguer Association.
Occhetto’s name is inseparable from the “Bolognina turning point.” On November 12, 1989—just three days after the fall of the Berlin Wall—he announced in a local PCI branch in Bologna’s Bolognina district that the party would change its name and identity. The decision led to the dissolution of the Communist Party and the creation of a new formation, the Democratic Party of the Left (PDS), positioned more clearly within the European social-democratic tradition.
Occhetto believed that breaking with the old ideological framework would accelerate the modernization of the Italian left—a process that, in many respects, did follow. Yet despite being remembered as the man who formally closed the PCI’s history, he was deeply shaped by it.
He joined the party in 1953 at just 17 and rose through its ranks from Milan to Rome, often taking positions that put him at odds with the leadership. In 1956, he promoted a university circle document condemning the Soviet invasion of Budapest—at a time when the party leadership supported Moscow. Later, as editor of the youth magazine Nuova Generazione, he encouraged critical reflections on the Soviet system. In a further symbolic break with Moscow, he met Lech Wałęsa, the Polish opposition leader who challenged the communist regime.
At 90, Occhetto remains a figure who embodies both the end of an era and the attempt to reshape it—closing the chapter of Italy’s largest communist party while seeking to guide the left into a different political landscape.