Descalzi to the FT: "Political correctness? I hate it. In Congo I took a risk"

"I hate political correctness, I see it as a constraint, a barrier. It's fake... I hate the mainstream." Eni CEO Claudio Descalzi (pictured) confesses to the Financial Times that he has long rejected the conformist thinking he encountered in Europe. And in an interview he reveals many anecdotes from his career and personal life. "You say what everyone says, and if you don't, you're not in the right club. This is a way of standing still. An empty box, an empty concept. In life, you have to question everything," he says.

In the 1990s, as civil war raged in the Republic of Congo , Descalzi says, the then 41-year-old manager slept under the bed with his daughters, to avoid being shot at night. "My wife was pregnant. Luckily she was able to leave the country. I was stuck with my two little girls," he says. Two years passed before he saw Italy again. "I was in charge of the expatriates who were left there. In those circumstances, the last thing you think about is cash flow or operations."

It wasn't the first difficult assignment abroad for Descalzi, who has now been at the helm of Eni for eleven years. When asked by FT how long he will remain at the helm of the company, Descalzi replied that "we are in a volatile situation, and it is not easy to change leadership very often. But obviously - he added - a CEO cannot stay forever".

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