Next Wednesday, Therese Ribera He will explain to the Congress of Deputies his responsibility in the prevention and detection of the floods which devastated the region of L’Horta Sud, in Valencia. This appearance is also the requirement that the European People’s Party has demanded to re-evaluate Ribera’s candidacy for vice-presidency of the European Commission.
The minister is obliged to clarify what happened on September 29 in the Hydrographic Confederation of Júcar (CHJ), due to her status as Minister of Ecological Transition. Portfolio on which the organization that supervises the basins concerned in the devastating DANA depends, which has so far caused 216 deaths.
As EL ESPAÑOL reveals today, The CHJ failed to fulfill its obligation to send notices to the emergency services on fifteen occasions. which requires its protocol at the key hour of the flooding of the Poyo ravine.
We can therefore no longer blame the central government alone for the fact that Ribera paralyzed in 2021 the planned adaptation, channeling and drainage works on the boulevard, which the CHJ considered “priority” to reduce the risks of flooding in the area. disaster area.
You must also take into account that CHJ technicians will take an hour and a half to prevent emergencies. that the flow of the Poyo exceeded the threshold of 150 cubic meters per second. Any excess of this level requires immediately informing the emergency services.
In light of this new information, the version given by Ribera in his audience last Tuesday, when he said that “[los avisos] were issued in due time”, but that “local authorities did not follow them”.
The story the government is trying to establish is that Carlos Mazon “he did not take seriously” the warnings from Aemet and the CHJ, and that is why he did not send the telephone alert until after eight in the afternoon.
But taking into account the fact that from 4:13 p.m. the Confederation stopped communicating in its emails to the Generalitat the state of the Poyo flow, The emergency alert simply could not have been issued much sooner.. Which was also sent for another reason: the risk of rupture of the Forata dam, on which the CHJ had focused its attention by sending only timely communications on the flow of the Magro.
It was only at 6:46 p.m. that the agency under the Ministry of Ribera informed the Emergency Committee that the Poyo was multiplying its flow by 100. When, in addition, the overflow had been wreaking havoc in towns like Paiporta for three minutes.
Ribera will be able to hide behind the fact that the Confederation communicates flow rates in real time, with meters updated every five minutes on its website. But you can’t deny it The CHJ was unable to convey the sense of risk until it was too late. depending on the extent of the threat. So much so that the minister called Mazón after the Rambla de Poyo overflowed.
It is therefore no longer a question of a partisan value judgment on the competence of a certain political leader. We are faced with the first objective proof of negligence on the part of a public body. And Ribera will have to answer to the citizens.
