The PSOE of Andalusia will appear in the case opened by Vera Court number 3 investigating the Los Gallardos (Almería) fire, in which 13 people died, according to the regional executive’s Political Communication secretary, Fernando López Gil, in response to questions from this newspaper. The socialists take this step after Thursday’s appearance by the First Vice President of the Government and Minister of Emergencies, Antonio Sanz, at his own request and that of other groups in the Andalusian Parliament.
The PSOE assures that its intervention has left “a sea of doubts” about the management of the Junta de Andalucía in the most serious fire that occurred in the community. The fire originated at 4:30 p.m. on July 9, was declared controlled four days later (on the 13th), and has not yet been extinguished.
The socialists focus on the three hours that elapsed from the first alert to 112 at 4:29 p.m. until 7:37 p.m. when operational situation 1 of the emergency phase of the Infoca plan was declared – which implies a threat to people’s lives – by order of the Minister of Emergencies, when people had already been evacuated from neighborhoods and hamlets of Los Gallardos and Bédar. “How is it possible that no one made decisions in this regard to guarantee people’s safety in that period of time? The foundations of a negligent response that led to a terrible outcome could have been laid,” said the PSOE deputy for Huelva and member of the regional executive, Mario Jiménez, at a press conference this Friday.
This leader has raised a series of questions that, in his opinion, Sanz left unanswered, such as “who was giving instructions to local officials who can only operate under the authority of the Junta de Andalucía?”. He also questioned the decision not to send an ES-Alert message to the population, a measure that the Minister of Emergencies justified in the plenary session by stating that each situation required different responses (evacuation or confinement) and also, that the “Bédar base station where the ES-Alert is broadcast was out of service” as a result of the fire.
The three left-wing groups in the Chamber (PSOE, Adelante Andalucía, and Por Andalucía) have called for the creation of an investigation commission in the Andalusian Parliament to demand political accountability. The socialist deputy specifically addressed Vox, the PP’s partner in the Andalusian Government, asking if “after 13 deaths, 7,000 hectares destroyed, and very significant damage, it will side with the people or be an accomplice to the PP’s strategies to prevent all information from being disclosed.”
Read more Almost half of the residents affected by the L9 sinkhole still have no return date
The coalition pact signed by the PP and Vox guarantees “unity of vote” in its point 150. And it expressly cites “the creation of investigation or study commissions by the opposition,” so it is very doubtful that the far-right will break this agreement.
Adelante Andalucía also defends the need to create an investigation commission after the explanations of the first vice president. “They left more doubts than answers. In the management of the Los Gallardos fire in Almería, there are too many dark spots and too many things that are unknown. This is important enough for the Junta de Andalucía to shed light and provide transparency on this situation, the causes, and the management of the emergency,” stated Adelante’s spokesperson, José Ignacio García.
According to him, “the families of the deceased deserve” the parliamentary investigation. He also called on PP and Vox to support it, because “when one has nothing to hide, one is not afraid of being investigated.”
The spokesperson for Por Andalucía, Antonio Maíllo, justified the request for the investigation commission due to the government’s “insufficient” response. “The vice president has not responded regarding the specifics of the events, the slowdown and slowness in the response from the Almería government delegation, and, above all, in the face of a vice president and a government that feels cornered, that is nervous because it knows there have been errors in management,” he emphasized.
Read more Innovation, water and resilience, drivers of the ecological transformation in Galicia
