No one is surprised that people like Mazón come to power, and it's dishonest to feign ignorance now that it's too late. After accusations of censorship, the documentary was finally released.Flood alertThe program denounces how pressure on the Catalan Water Agency (ACA) has allowed construction in flood-prone areas. Those who were supposed to protect us were the ones granting the permits. The program ended with this quote from a geology professor: "It's not right to play with other people's risks to line my own pockets."
I live between two streams, next to the center of Sant Feliu de Guíxols, a municipality with a very high risk of flooding and whose Emergency Plan expired long ago. My town has 52 municipal infrastructures and heritage sites in a flood zone: it's the fifth most at-risk town in Catalonia. On the civil protection map, my house is in a red zone, meaning an area at risk of river flooding within the next ten years.
Every day, from home, I see how the City Council is covering one of the two streams. Given the devastating floods, I thought someone in charge would stop these works. But no. On the contrary. I asked a former councilor for Urban Planning in Sant Feliu. "Ecologically," I told him, "I already think it's foolish to cover a stream, but, with what happened in Valencia, wouldn't it be prudent to stop these works?" His answer chilled me to the bone: he told me that the water flowed more easily this way. I didn't reply. Does covering a stream increase its drainage capacity? What about in case of torrential rain? Doesn't it create a barrier at the mouth of the stream? Doesn't it get clogged? Officials at the Catalan Water Agency (ACA) who grant the permit: does a covered stream really drain better than an open one?
When we talk about the decline of democracy, we mean this distrust. Mazón's excuse—"I didn't know anything"—is a variation of "I was just following orders." A citizen like me, who knows nothing about hydrology, should be able to trust those in charge, and that's not the case. We've seen so much irresponsibility in this country that there's little more you can do than put it on record and pray that the public official in charge has some moral scruples. Giorgio Agamben strongly warns against trusting the expert who claims to speak in the name of scientific truth when, in reality, he speaks on behalf of "powers that have hired him to speak."
Ultimately, people of Mazón's caliber will end up justifying themselves by saying they were elected, and therefore, the responsibility is collective. This is partly true, but not entirely, because without the personal responsibility of the politician, democracy is impossible.
