Alex Trelinski
VALENCIA president Carlos Mazon has apologised for mistakes made during the handling of the region’s flood disaster which has so far claimed 216 lives, but he has refused to resign.
The under-fire leader spoke to the regional parliament- Les Corts- on Friday where he promised a commission of inquiry into the way the emergency was dealt with.
In a lengthy address, Mazon said that he will not shirk responsibility for the management of the DANA and apologised to those who ‘felt’ that ‘the help did not arrive or was insufficient’.
READ MORE:
- Interior designers, architects, and decorators come together to make Valencia’s flood-devastated properties habitable
- Valencia DANA deaths latest: Almost half of people killed were aged over 70 – as missing persons figure is updated
“It could have been done better,“ he admitted.
He has been widely criticised for having lunch with a journalist during the afternoon of October 29 rather than being on hand to deal with a fast-developing crisis.
He made no reference to that in his speech.
No alert was sent to residents until 8.11pm by which time severe flooding had struck.
He defended his stance and said that a text alert system had never been used before- though test messages had been sent previously.
Mazon also blamed the State Meteorological Agency(Aemet) and the independent Jucar authority that looks after the river basin and water resources for not providing information in time.
The Valencian president said answers are needed about what happened and why it happened, and has defended that ‘it is legitimate to ask’ if the prevention and alert systems offered all the possible guarantees, or if all the alert protocols were designed to correct even a human error when being applied’.
“Valencians have the right to know everything that happened, the information that was handled and the decisions that were taken during the course of an emergency for which today and now we must seek an explanation”, he stated.
“We need to know why our previous experience in this type of situation and the fine-tuned protocols that had worked until then were not enough to avoid or alleviate the terrible damage we have suffered,” he added.
With a protest calling for him to quit outside the parliament building in Valencia City, Mazon made no reference to his position.
Instead he unveiled a government reshuffle which will include a new ministry for ‘Emergencies and the Interior’ and a ministry to drive recovery for the flood-hit areas.
The Ministry of Emergencies and Interior will be ‘the pillar’ that sustains the Valencian Community in difficult times and the ‘beacon’ that guides it, said Mazon.
The ruling Partido Popular parliamentary spokesperson, Juan Francisco Perez Llorca, said that Mazon is not going to resign ‘under any circumstances’.
“There is no one better than him to lead the reconstruction after the DANA of October 29,” he added.
Opposition parties led by the socialist PSPV have called for Carlos Mazon to go and for regional elections to be held next year.
The party’s leader in Les Corts, Diana Morant, said: “We cannot continue to be governed by a negligent and incompetent president.”
“If Mazon does not resign, it should be the Partido Popular and (leader) Alberto Nuñez Feijoo who must remove him,” Morant added.
She has pledged her party’s parliamentary votes to elect a ‘technical and transitional government and to call elections when the emergency makes it possible’.
