CARLOS Mazón, the president of Spain’s eastern Valencia region, has finally announced his resignation over his administration’s handling of last year’s deadly October floods that killed 229 people.
Mazón, a member of the conservative Partido Popular (PP), had faced growing calls to step down over his government’s slow response to the crisis – including a recent revelation that he spent more than three hours having lunch with a journalist as the extreme weather hit.
But the Alicante-born politician, who became president in 2023 after forming a coalition with far-right Vox, sought to cling on to his role amid a growing tide of angry protests – even after admitting last week that ‘things should have worked better’.
The wishes of many came true on Monday morning as Mazón formally announced his departure during a hastily-arranged press conference.
“I made errors and I will live with that for the rest of my life,” Mazón admitted.
He had previously insisted there was ‘no government in the world that has the tools to alter, stop or avoid an episode of torrential rains that end up pummelling historical rainfall records in a given area at a given time’.
Last week, Mazón was greeted with cries of ‘murderer’ and ‘coward’ from an angry crowd as he arrived at a memorial service commemorating the first anniversary of the disaster.
Many victims’ relatives have slammed Mazón’s government for a slow response to the worst floods to hit Europe in decades – with his administration only sending out an emergency alert at 8pm on the day of the floods.
A recent poll was equally damning, with three-quarters of Valencians saying they thought Mazón should resign.
A congressional enquiry into the floods is underway in order to determine whether there is any evidence of negligence that may have led to avoidable deaths.
