We are still shocked by the scale of the DANA tragedy which devastated the province of Valencia. We do not even know six days after the disaster the total number of deaths. Mud, piles of vehicles and objects clutter the streets of the densely populated villages near the Valencian capital, not to mention the smells of putrefaction and humidity. After the desolation come questions and citizen indignation. How is it possible that in 2024 the population could not have been warned to minimize the victims? How is it possible that if AEMET had alerted all last weekend and on Tuesday October 29 at 7:37 a.m. it issued an alarming forecast, the emergency was not activated for citizens? This political decision would have saved many lives. There will surely be a legal procedure in which politicians like Carlos Mazón, president of the Generalitat of Valencia, will be held responsible. This politician who eliminated Valencia’s emergencies because he considered them a beach bar for the previous socialist president, Ximo Puig, demonstrated a great incapacity to govern the destiny of Valencians. Recall that the PP is obsessed with emergency services, since it declared that the Military Emergency Unit (UME) was the pharaonic whim of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero. But Mazón will have to give a lot of explanations. And above all, answer two fundamental questions: why did you trigger the alarm so late, at 8:12 p.m., when there were already deaths and people having serious problems because of the water? Where did you learn that DANA was moving away toward the Cuenca Mountains, as stated during a 1 p.m. appearance and posted in a tweet that was later deleted? And there, Carlos Mazón continues to display his incapacity and his sectarianism. Acting late and badly, by rejecting aid from autonomy like Andalusia, Basque or Catalan, without ceding powers. Everything for your chair. It is incomprehensible that he has not yet resigned.
The University of Valencia has done its homework and protected its workers (professors and administrative and service staff) and its students. I received an email on Tuesday 29th at noon from the organization of the International Congress: Dissident memoirs. Gender and sexuality in the face of Francoism because Thursday the 31st I had to close it. In that first email, it was stated that mid-morning the congress had been suspended due to wind alert 3. And then I received another email at night and more in the following days. If the University had not made this crucial decision, there would surely be even more victims to mourn.
