The president of the Generalitat Valenciana, Carlos Mazón, is changing his communication strategy to manage the crisis caused by DANA. The leader of the Valencian PP, who first tried to show unity with the Spanish government, now accuses state organizations like the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar of not having warned of the risk or of considering that the Military Unit of The emergency had autonomy to operate. .
Six days after the disaster began, under all the spotlight and under pressure from his own party, Mazón participated in a series of interviews. The Valencian president insisted to Cadena COPE and Antena 3 that he does not hold anyone responsible and has not defended himself so far because he did not consider it “moral” given the context of tragedy. elDiario.es reviews some of the lies, truths and inaccuracies of the leader of the Valencian PP.
To the question “what do you feel when you hear the phrase If they need help, ask for it.“, replies the Valencian president: “Well, we had done it from the beginning.” The Valencian president declares: “Once the EMU is activated, from this Tuesday at 3:21 p.m., no one needs to no autonomous government to request more reinforcements, it is the operational command of the UME that is deployed which, if it needs more reinforcements or more material, at the moment, calls Torrejón and they join.
Fake. The assistance of the Military Emergency Unit is required at the time indicated by the Valencian president in the towns of Utiel and Requena. This is recognized by the Ministry of Justice, which in a press release stated that it had “asked the Government Delegation to incorporate the Military Emergency Unit to intervene in the region of Requena and Utiel, which is experiencing a heavy episode of rain which caused the overflow of the Río Magro, and their action is necessary to collaborate in the rescues, as reported by the Minister of Justice and Interior, Salomé Pradas. That morning, CECOPI was convened, in the presence of the minister and the head of emergencies, Emilio Argüeso. The request for aid to the UME for the rest of the province of Valencia was not made until 8 p.m.
“Once the activation of the EMU is requested, it is no longer necessary to request additional reinforcements,” Mazón says in another interview on Antena 3, emphasizing the idea that this unit operates autonomously.
Fake. The head of the UME, who speaks publicly for the first time, categorically denied this assertion: “At alert level 2, the one who directs the emergency is the Autonomous Community, the one who decides where we go or where we go . not go, it’s the Autonomous Community. It is the emergency director who tells us where to act, and we did it with discipline. “I can deploy and mobilize my men but I cannot enter until the director of emergencies of the Generalitat authorizes me,” he declared this Monday during an appearance. General Francisco Javier Marcos stressed: “As soon as we had the green light to intervene in the rest of the province, 1,000 soldiers were deployed so that the inhabitants of Valencia could see at dawn on Wednesday that we were there” and claims they took a while to arrive due to adverse weather conditions.
In a statement on Friday, November 1, President Mazón acknowledged having requested help from the government: “As those on the ground provide us with information, we take stock of the moment (…) as the x-ray is updated as needed, additional contributions are requested. It was in this intervention that he demanded more soldiers and more resources from the Government, to which he “thanked for its predisposition”, and declared that he had carried out a “constant and permanent radiography”. Contrary to what was assured this Monday, Mazón had thus recognized that it is the autonomous community which is asking for more resources from the UME. The Presidency of the Generalitat categorically denies that this statement implies holding the UME responsible.
President Mazón claims that the Júcar Hydrographic Confederation (CHJ) deactivated the alerts “three times” due to the flooding of the ravines. It even mentions the times it “turns off”.
Fake. The confederation, dependent on the ministry, specifies that it periodically transfers “objective measurement data”. At noon, they detected a drop in flow, which increased “from 5 p.m.”. Half an hour later, the flow returns to the same point where the Generalitat Valenciana issues the alert. “These data do not imply any deactivation of the alert issued by the Emergency Coordination Center of the Generalitat Valenciana. These are only objective capacity measurement data,” the statement said. The CHJ assures that its job is to inform, not to alert. The ministry sent a press release in which it transfers hour by hour the information provided to the Emergency Coordination Center of the Generalitat Valenciana. “However, this time, the regional authorities have not issued a new alert,” specifies the CHJ.
The Valencian president tried to link the late sending of the mobile phone alert by the Generalitat Valenciana to the situation at the Forata dam. He specifies that the risk alert at the Forata dam was sent around seven o’clock in the afternoon by the CHJ.
Fake. It is not up to the CHJ to send alerts and the Regional Emergency Service itself sent one at 5:30 p.m. In addition, the Generalitat alert of 8:12 p.m. is issued due to the possible overflow of the Forata dam, and not the Poyo ravine, whose ravine caused the majority of deaths.
Mazón says: “When the hydrological alert is activated early in the morning, it is then deactivated three times. And it was only at 6:45 p.m. (…) that it was said that everything had changed. Half an hour later came the communication of the possible rupture of the Forata dam.
Imprecision and lies. The Forata Dam is on the Magro River, a tributary of the Júcar, and what overflowed was the Chiva ravine (Poyo ravine), causing dozens of deaths. The devastation of the floods was not caused by this dam that controls part of the Júcar (which did not break), but by the Poyo ravine (Chiva ravine), a boulevard of which the Emergency Center knew the dangerous situation since 12:20 p.m. . At that time, the Emergency Coordination Center reported: “The Confederation received notification of increased flow in the Rambla de Poyo, with a record of 264 cubic meters per second at the capacity of Riba-Roja del Turia. The hydrological alert is activated in neighboring communities. The “advice to the population” which appears in this notice specifies: “Do not approach the banks of rivers and ravines which could be active”.
The CHJ indicates that “from 5 p.m., a sharp increase in the flow of the Barranco del Poyo was detected. At 5:30 p.m., it reached the same level of capacity that motivated the alert issued by the Emergency Coordination Center of the Generalitat Valenciana at noon. But this time, regional authorities have not issued a new alert. At 6:55 p.m., the flow reached 2,282 cubic meters per second, at which point the force of the water, which had been reflected two hours previously, ended up driving the measuring systems.” At the time the alert reached the telephones, the Poyo ravine was already overflowing into Horta Sud.
The CHJ measurement system detects a drop in the flow of the Chiva ravine during the central hours of the day, without any alert being deactivated. From 5 p.m., the torrential rains at the sources of the rivers cause an increase in the flow to the point of tripling the flow of the Ebro, as explained by the meteorologist from À Punt, Victoria Rosselló.
The president of the Generalitat Valenciana has repeatedly stressed that a “Valencian meteorological revolution” is underway.
Imprecision. On Tuesday afternoon, a phenomenon called a mesoscale convective system occurred: a cloud that feeds on seawater, causing a violent storm. There were advance warnings of storm risks and real-time information. Aemet issued an alert at 7:30 a.m.
Given the first flood of the Barranco del Poyo, which occurred on Tuesday October 29 around 12:30 p.m., the Emergency Coordination Center of the Generalitat Valenciana issued the hydrological alert. In this alert, citizens were warned of the danger of approaching banks and ravines. This danger was preceded by an AEMET alert issued Tuesday morning at 7:31 a.m., extended until 9:30 a.m.
The Valencian president insists that at 7:30 a.m., 112 set the red level and that “thanks to this forecast alert”, they informed the town halls, who were able to suspend classes.
Fake. The mayors of the most affected municipalities complained about the lack of information from Emergency Services which prevented them from reacting in time to warn neighbors.
While the mayor of Aldaia, Guillermo Luján, assures that he did not receive any type of emergency notice throughout the day of October 29, the mayor of Catarroja assures that he only received the hydrological alert from 12:30 p.m. by email and SMS. very generic message, which warned not to approach the ravines. The ravine crosses around ten municipalities. “The rest of the day we did not receive any communication about the situation in the ravine, although we have already established controls and communications with Chiva to see the situation. At 5:30 p.m., there was a meter of water and by 6:30 p.m., it was already overflowing. In half an hour he was on the Camí Real. Formally, no one from 112 gave us any information on the cubic meters or the situation. During the last legislature, when there was an alert, they summoned the populations concerned to telematic meetings,” explains Lorena Silvent, mayor of Catarroja.
Cleaning the canals. The President of the Generalitat dishonors the Ministry of Ecological Transition for the poor maintenance of canals and ravines, an aggravating factor in the climate crisis.
TRUE. Cleaning is the responsibility of the Hydrographic Confederation, dependent on the ministry, and is a constant request from mayors of all political persuasions. Advisors constantly ask that we give them the means to face this task.
The Valencian president also said that the government delegate, Pilar Bernabé, held a meeting at 10:29 a.m. and was not summoned.
Fake. The delegate called at 9:30 a.m. all the agents of the General Administration of the State who depend on her, in anticipation that the Generalitat could mobilize them, based on the alerts issued by AEMET regarding the storms. He posted it on his Twitter account (X). “At 9:30 a.m., I find @AEMET_CValence@DGTes, Highway Demarcation, @guardiacivil @policia @UMEgob @Adif_es @Renfe and @CHJucar to analyze the DANA situation,” explained the delegate. At 9 a.m., the president had the plenary session of the Consell on his agenda.
Ten minutes earlier, Mazón’s profile in X asked for “caution on the roads” and “pay particular attention to instructions from authorities.” The message included a previous tweet from Emergencies 112 about the red level alert on the south coast of Valencia, which asked people to avoid driving “if it is not necessary”.
