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Anger remains high after floods devastated southeastern Spain
“Assassins, assassins!”: tens of thousands of people demonstrated their anger on Saturday in Valencia against the political class for its management of the floods which left at least 220 dead in the south-east of Spain last week. Demonstrators met at the end of the day on the large square in front of the Valencia town hall to walk the kilometer that separates it from the seat of the regional government. They demanded in particular “the resignation” of its president Carlos Mazón (Popular Party, right), but the socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has not been spared from criticism either. The two men are accused by the victims of having underestimated the risks and poorly coordinated the relief after the floods of October 29, which devastated nearly 80 municipalities. For Julián García, 73, “Mazón's management has been indecent and he should resign. The Valencian government is responsible and did not want to ask what it could ask of the central government, also a little responsible”, estimates the retiree. Ana de la Rosa, 30, regrets the “political wars when it was not the time, because the citizens needed help and did not have it”. The archivist calls for “justice” for what she describes as “manslaughter”. Gatherings also took place in several other Spanish cities, such as Madrid and Alicante. In Valencia, some clashes broke out between demonstrators and the police, noted an AFP journalist. “Solo el pueblo salva el pueblo” (“Only the people save the people”): in Valencia, this slogan became popular in conversations after the spontaneous wave of solidarity that took place. is organized to compensate for the supposed errors of the authorities. In Valencia, the grievances focused on Carlos Mazón, who had been targeted on Sunday in Paiporta, like the head of government and the sovereigns Felipe VI and Letizia, by insults and throwing of mud – unprecedented images depicting the exasperation in devastated areas. Figure of the Popular Party, Mr. Mazón, a 50-year-old lawyer, is accused of having been slow to react even though the Spanish Meteorological Agency (Aemet) had issued a red alert on the morning of October 29. – Dozens missing – He is also accused of having been absent for several hours when it was already starting to rain and the emergency committee had met. Carlos Mazón defended himself by assuring that he participated in “a working lunch” in a restaurant in Valencia with a journalist, according to the Spanish media.Among the accusations also made by the victims, the fact that the entire The population was only alerted via mobile phones in the evening, when many areas were already submerged. The region's main emergency manager, Salomé Pradas, admitted on Thursday that she was unaware of the existence of this alert system, before retracting. In Spain, a very decentralized country, disaster management is the responsibility regional administrations, but the central government, responsible for issuing alerts via Aemet, can provide resources and even take control in extreme cases. It is precisely this last point which motivates the criticism of the right-wing opposition, which accuses the head of the socialist government of having let the region sink through political calculations instead of regaining control. Pedro Sánchez acted “in bad faith”, criticized Miguel Tellado, the spokesperson for the PP in parliament. Sources close to the government assure for their part that they want to define in due time the possible responsibilities of each person and the possible failures in management of the disaster, while affirming that the government has done everything it could do within the current institutional framework. The authorities continued on Saturday their search operations for the missing who are concentrated in Albufeira and the Valencia lagoon. Dozens of people are still wanted, according to the Superior Court of Justice of the Valencia region.al/we/mdm/mba
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