VALENCIA, Spain (AP) — Tens of thousands of Spaniards demonstrated in the eastern city of Valencia on Saturday to demand the resignation of the regional president responsible for emergency aid following last week’s crisis. catastrophic flooding leaving more than 200 dead and others missing.
A group of demonstrators clashed with riot police in front of Valencia City Hall, where demonstrators began their march towards the seat of the regional government. The police used batons to beat them back.
Regional leader Carlos Mazón is under immense pressure after his government failed so far to send flood warnings to citizens’ mobile phones hours after the flooding started on the night of October 29.
Many protesters held up homemade signs or chanted “Mazón Resign!” Others carried signs with messages like “You killed us!” Upon arriving at the regional government seat, some demonstrators threw mud on the building, leaving handprints from the mud on the facade.
Earlier on Saturday, Mazón told regional broadcaster À Punt that “there will be time to hold officials accountable,” but that now is “the time to continue cleaning our streets, helping people and rebuilding.”
He said he “respected” the march.
Mazón, from the conservative Popular Party, has also been criticized for what people see as the slow and chaotic response to the natural disaster. Thousands of volunteers were the first boots on the ground in many of the worst affected areas on the southern outskirts of Valencia. It took days for officials to mobilize the thousands of police reinforcements and soldiers that the regional government had asked central authorities to send.
In Spain, regional authorities are responsible for civil protection and can ask the national government in Madrid, led by the Socialists, for additional resources.
Mazón has defended his handling of the crisis, saying its scale was unforeseeable and that his government did not receive sufficient warnings from central authorities.
But the Spanish weather agency issued a red alert, the highest warning level, for bad weather as early as 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday morning as disaster threatened.
Some communities were flooded by 6 p.m. It wasn’t until after 8 p.m. that Mazón’s government sent alerts to people’s cellphones.
Mazón was then with the Spanish royal family and the socialist prime minister pelted with mud by angry residents during their first visit to a devastated area last weekend.
Sara Sánchez Gurillo attended the protest because she had lost her brother-in-law, 62-year-old Candido Molina Pulgarín. She said his body was found in a field of orange trees after he was stuck in water at his home in the town of Cheste, west of Valencia.
She wanted Mazón to leave, but also had harsh words for the country’s leaders.
“It’s shameful what happened,” Sánchez said. “They knew the sky was going to fall and yet they warned no one. They didn’t evacuate the people. We want them to resign!”
“The central government should have taken the lead. They should have sent the army sooner. The king should have had them send it in. Why do we want him as a symbolic figure? He’s worthless. The people are alone. They have let us down.”
The death toll reached 220 victims on Saturday, of which 212 in the eastern Valencia region. search for bodies continues.
Thousands more have lost their homes and the streets are still covered in mud and debris, 11 days after the arrival of a tsunami-like wave following a record flood.
___ Joseph Wilson reported from Barcelona.
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