For two weeks, municipalities in the region have been virtually left to their own devices by public authorities, as much of the population turns to mutual aid networks to find survivors and provide material support

~ Sonia Muñoz Llort ~

From Thursday and through the weekend, numerous demonstrations have taken place throughout the district of Valencia and in wider Catalonia, demanding the resignation of regional governor Carlos Mazón and showing support for the victims of the flooding disaster.

According to recent reports, the storm left 223 dead and 89 are still missing. Some of the demonstrations were organised by leftist political parties, others by the trade union coalition. On Saturday evening, a police cordon blocked an anti-capitalist procession and provoked the crowd gathered in front of the town hall in Valencia, where clashes broke out.

It is now well known that the tragic flooding was initially caused by an isolated depression in high levels of the atmosphere (known in Spanish as “Dana”), clearly exacerbated by the climate changes. Yet it was the political and corporate response which left people unprotected.

Here responsibility lies with Mazón, who had dismantled the regional emergency response unit, and on the day of the storm played down the severity of the weather warnings. It also lies with the business owners who forced the workers to stay in their workplaces, ignoring the few alarms that were issued to the population.

Earlier, on Sunday 3 November, the King and Queen of Spain who visited the affected area together with Mazón, were met by crowds who threw mud and objects at them and called out “murderers”. On the legal front, on Tuesday the CGT presented a letter to the Provincial Prosecutor’s Office of Valencia accusing the governor of not having adopted measures to prevent the death or disappearance of so many people.

For two weeks, municipalities around Valencia have been virtually left to their own devices by the public authorities. Much of the population turned to mutual aid networks such as Xarxa de Suport Mutu DANA València, which formed to finding missing people and to bring various forms of support to those affected by the flood.

“We are talking about initiatives that have emerged now in response to this need, but that have been years of work behind them”, said Barcelona anarchist assembly Heura Negra in a communique, “These are local houses, workshops, and self-managed centres, feminist assemblies and neighbourhood networks, class unions and housing unions, whose daily work guarantees community structures that, in times like these, become more necessary than ever”.