They criticize that he entered to testify about the dana «through the back door»: «He doesn’t want to look us in the eyes and say that he has abandoned us»
Firefighters from the Provincial Consortium of Valencia have gathered this Thursday in front of the City of Justice in the capital of Turia, where the President of the Diputación is testifying as a witness for the October 29th barrancada, shouting ‘Mompó resignation’ and warning: «We are not prepared for another dana’.
These professionals have gathered since early in the morning amid loud whistles and with banners reading messages such as ‘Resignation of the leadership. Go with Mazón’; ‘Mompó, after the dana you have not learned anything’; ‘Firefighters in struggle’, ‘Unprotected populations. Risks to their lives’. They have also thrown some eggs and smoke bombs.
Amid cries of ‘Fewer firefighters and more bullfighters’ or ‘Killers’, the protesters awaited the arrival of Mompó, who avoided the main entrance, prompting criticism from the protesters: «Coward,» they retorted.
Helios Martínez, a firefighter from Paterna and a union delegate, reproached: «That proves us right because, if he had it, he would have walked past here with his head held high, but he did not deign to look us in the eyes». «Mompó entered through the back door because he does not want to look the firefighters in the eye and tell them that he has abandoned us».
«WITHOUT VEHICLES, WITHOUT TRAINING, WITHOUT PERSONNEL»
Likewise, he warned that they are not prepared to handle emergencies, nor summer fires, and they are «even worse» prepared for a new cold drop in autumn: «We are without vehicles, without training, without personnel, we do not have sludge pumps to remove the mud, we are completely abandoned, and the citizen must know that there is no plan, no strategy to face this autumn the next dana, it would be a real madness, a chaos».
In the same line, he lamented that they were promised to modernize and invest in the service after the flood, but «the proposal to increase personnel starts from 2027 and would have to be addressed in the next legislature until 2032 when we already have the urgency».
«They make us choose between our health or more personnel. They always use the budget ceiling as an excuse when the safety and health of the citizens must be above all this. We cannot allow budgets to condition the safety and health of the worker, which will affect the citizens,» added the union delegate Jesús Gómez.
Thus, he pointed out that on October 29th «there were 250 missing personnel in the Valencia Fire Consortium and right now we have a deficit of 200 personnel. This needs to be addressed because a dana can happen from now on».
«WE CAN’T TAKE IT ANYMORE»
In this line, they complained that after October 29th, «it was all promises, they knew that people had suffered and they had to show off to say that they would be there for the citizens». «Well, to us, who are the first force to act in an emergency, they have abandoned us, we are a service that costs money and because it costs money, they do not attend to us,» they add.
In that sense, when asked about their situation compared to the increase in the budget for bullfighting by the provincial institution, he replied: «There is one thing that everyone will understand: essential services, which are the first thing to be addressed, and the firefighters’ situation is already unsustainable. We can’t take it anymore, we are completely abandoned».
