after disastrous floods, the region's president admits mistakes

INTERNATIONAL – An expected mea culpa. The president of the Valencia region in southern Spain admitted “mistakes” in the response to last month's dramatic floods and presented « excuses » for the delays in helping the victims, while justifying its action.

“I’m not going to deny (that there were) mistakes”declared Carlos Mazón, member of the Popular Party (PP, conservative right), in a long speech before the regional parliament this Friday, November 15, as you can see in our video at the top of the article. “I will not evade any responsibility”he added in total silence.

The politician thus agrees to report on his reaction – much criticized – to this unprecedented crisis, the provisional toll of which was 224 deaths in the country on Friday. Most of the victims (216 people) were recorded in the Valencia region. There were also seven deaths in the neighboring region of Castile-La Mancha and one in Andalusia. Carlos Mazón said 16 people remained missing in the Valencia region.

“Liar”, “murderer”

Carlos Mazón began his speech by recalling that it was about “of the worst floods that Spain has suffered since 1962”a theme to which he returned several times to clearly show that no one could foresee a catastrophe of such importance. “Everyone understands that the scale of the tragedy and its consequences mean that there will be a before and an after in our lives and that nothing will ever be the same again”he said.

Outside Parliament, cries of ” liar “ et « assassin » were launched by the crowd during Carlos Mazón's speech, whose attitude on October 29, the day of the floods, in particular the delay in sending by his services an alert to residents to warn them of the extreme danger of the rains torrential rains which had been falling since the beginning of the morning, were singled out. “This government does not represent us”shouted the demonstrators, who again demanded his resignation.

Main target of the anger of the victims, Carlos Mazón was attacked by a crowd of demonstrators in the town of Paiporta, near Valencia, on November 3, during a very tense visit by King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia . Just like the socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, also present alongside the sovereigns, he had to be exfiltrated very quickly to escape the demonstrators, who had copiously insulted them and threw mud at them.

Red alert minimization

On October 29, it was only after 8 p.m., more than 12 hours after the first red alert launched by the meteorological agency Aemet, that the services of the Generalitat (the local government) had sent to the cell phones of residents a message asking them to stay at home or return immediately due to the risk of flooding. But by then, many communities were already flooded and hundreds of people were stranded on the roads in their vehicles. Many could not be saved.

Referring to this Aemet red alert, Carlos Mazón clearly downplayed its importance, saying that this type of alert had “produced 36 times during the last 10 years without any of them being followed by sudden floods like these” from last month.

“Many of these warnings did not even result in notable flooding”he added, as if to justify the fact that his services waited so long before warning the population. He stressed that his party's parliamentary group had requested the creation of a commission of inquiry by the regional parliament.

This appearance before the regional parliament, which takes place both at his request and that of the opposition, was initially scheduled for Thursday, but was postponed due to the new red alert for heavy rains issued Wednesday evening by Aemet.

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