It has been a long time since a mass demonstration dared to choose the Praza do Obradoiro as the location for its final act. Normally the marches end in Compostela in A Quintana, whose capacity is not half that of the main square of the Galician capital, which can accommodate more than 20,000 people (and almost 17,000 when it rains and you have to open). the umbrellas). The march “in defense of the future of the sea”, supported by almost 150 groups from the sector, environmental groups, unions and all the opposition parties of the Galician PP, dared to end in O Obradoiro – as in times of noise and indignation about Never again – and filled it (until almost the last moment without an umbrella because it was just drizzling). So much so that we waited from the stage for more than an hour to read the manifesto as the flood of people continued to invade the square. And when it was finally decided that it had to be read out now, that the group of bagpipes and drums couldn't fuel the wait any longer, people continued to stream in and many missed the speech.
Due to the size of Galicia's most representative monumental promenade of 7,700 square meters, organizers estimated that several tens of thousands of people braved the cold and damp weather forecasts to confirm that the spirit of Never Again is still alive with the prestige, even 21 years after its birth -Catastrophe. And to cry out against “politicians who make the same mistakes again”: “hiding, lying, denying” and “putting the health” of people and “the environment at risk.” The local police reduced the participation in this march, which was developed by organizations for the defense of the maritime sectors even before the last dumping of pellets in the Atlantic, to “about 15,000” souls.
Goldfish swallow white balls; seahorses; skeletons; networks; the sieves, rakes, brooms and sieves that volunteers used to harvest the daily flood of pellets for two long weeks; or a mermaid vomiting the same plastic granules (drawn by the artist Leandro Lamas), were some of the images that wandered through the streets of Santiago this Sunday lunchtime from the meeting point in the Alameda of the Galician capital. The leaders of the main parties (except the PP), candidates for the next elections in Galicia, took part in the event: Ana Pontón, spokesperson of the first opposition force, the BNG; even Marta Lois (Sumar), accompanied by the second vice president of the government, Yolanda Díaz; Irene Montero, political secretary of Podemos; and fellow candidate José Ramón Gómez Besteiro (PSdeG), after attending the closing of the PSOE National Convention together with Pedro Sánchez.
At this last event, which took place in the city of A Coruña, they went live to show participants images of the demonstration. And Sánchez used the opportunity to bring charges against the Xunta, “a government that rules in apathy, lies and mismanagement,” criticized the government president. “When there is a crisis, we who govern must deal with these crises, exercise leadership and, what the Xunta have heard, say that the beaches are the responsibility of the city councils and the sea, the government of Spain,” threw he before. “A bad situation can get worse, and that is exactly what happened with the pellet crisis,” he defended himself: “The Xunta responded with pride to the hand that the Spanish government extended to them of loyal cooperation.”
Protest against the management for the disposal of the “pellets” this Sunday in Santiago de Compostela. Álvaro Ballesteros / Europa Press (Europa Press)
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“Welcome, people of the sea, welcome colleagues who feel that the land and the sea are our responsibility. They are our way of life. “The heritage that we preserve, that sustains us and that we must take care of for future generations,” said one of the readers of the manifesto from the box, which is supported by almost 150 groups, many of them sailors, shell collectors, environmental groups or those , affected by mining disasters. . At that moment, a cloud of Socialist Party flags and militants who had stayed behind because their leaders had to travel from the event in A Coruña were still trying to enter the square.
“Our rulers are in confusion. They think the sea can do everything. Instead of taking action, they prefer to hide, lie and deny. As if we were as ignorant as they are,” a marine representative continued to shout. “They underestimate us, they endanger our health and that of the environment. With the Prestige they are making the mistakes of 20 years ago again. And once again it is the citizens who have to solve the problems. Once again we were the ones who went to the beaches without protective equipment and without containers to remove the pellets.”
“From O Obradoiro, a space that represents all Galicians, today we denounce the defenselessness of our coast and our sea,” he added. “In recent weeks a flood of toxic granules has flooded the coast. The massive arrival of pellets has shown once again how the Xunta de Galicia downplays the problems, ignores scientific data and solves them only with lies and incompetence.”
Protest against the management for the disposal of the “pellets” this Sunday in Santiago de Compostela. Álvaro Ballesteros / Europa Press (Europa Press)
At the same time as the big demonstration in Santiago, the PP was holding the popular Interparliamentary Meeting in Ourense. Xunta president and PP candidate Alfonso Rueda attacked the Galician opposition, particularly his main rival in the polls, the Galician Nationalist Bloc. He accused him of spreading “lies and false reports” that caused “damage” to the fishing sector and then, in the same spirit as in previous days, Rueda invited people to “eat the best fish in the world”. The government of Xunta announced to the Galician Association of Fishermen's Guilds, four days before the demonstration (which was expected to be massive in any case) and a month before the regional elections, the distribution of 15 million euros in aid to the sector due to the loss of production due to the “torrential rains “this fall-winter. At the same time, the Rueda executive has launched a propaganda campaign in the media under the slogan “A-Mar Galicia”: “Feed on Galician fish and seafood, not on fake news.”
But on the streets this Sunday, demonstrators denied that their act was “partisan” and chanted slogans against Alfonso Rueda, the Xunta and its councilors. “Rad, be careful, the sea is not for sale”, “Xunta, listen, the sea is fighting”, “we want to work and not emigrate” and above all “in-com-pe-ten-cia.”, sounded from start to finish. “This white prestige, whose harmful effects on the environment will last for decades, shows the failure of everything that was learned 20 years ago, the failure of operational maritime security systems, both sea rescue dependent on the state and sea rescue the Coast Guard. depending on the Xunta,” another speaker continued, reeling off the manifesto from the stage after half past one in the afternoon.
“Where are the ships with surveillance drones to monitor the marine environment? “Where are the operational oceanographic means to determine the movement of the bags at sea?” asked the reader of the manifesto about the means that are not being used to combat the leak that the fallen container of the Toconao ship continues to leak from the bottom of the Atlantic spits out on December 8th with 26 tons of plastic pellets. “How can you explain that the Xunta takes a month to activate the emergency and maritime casualty plan? [Camgal] and that, under pressure from the public, it issues a report stating that it is inert material and suitable for food use?” he continued.
“35 ships carrying toxic goods” per day
“We cannot allow this nonsense. Counting only ships carrying toxic goods, 35 ships pass our coasts every day, which contain some of the greatest wealth of biodiversity and marine resources in the world. That it feeds us and identifies us as a country,” the speaker continued after taking the place of the first speaker in the middle of the text. “Our sea needs professional, coordinated and transparent management. Increased inspection and control of vessels passing through the Fisterra traffic separation facility.”
“We demand coordinated action from the Xunta and the state, transparent information, the removal of the bags at sea and the provision of means to collect them on the coast. We demand adequate protection measures for volunteers and special containers on the beaches,” he then claimed to applause, while many demonstrators raised their arms with the sieve that has become the symbol of this crisis, the weapon of patient sieving improvised by the volunteers. the sand. “We demand transparency about the toxicity of materials and their impact on health and marine ecosystems. “We cannot allow the oceans to become a plastic waste dump,” he concluded, just before segueing into a music concert that put the finishing touches to the event. “We demand that international institutions declare plastic pellets as dangerous goods. No more lies and incompetence in defense of our sea.”
Shellfish “at risk of extinction”
The president of the Platform for the Defense of the Ría de Arousa (PDRA), Xocas Rubido, accused before the start of the march that the Xunta had not fulfilled “its duties” and “failed to exercise its powers”. “If we abandon our sea, our shellfish harvest risks disappearing,” he warned. For his part, the president of the Platform in Defense of the Ría de Muros e Noia, Rogelio Santos Queiruga, intervened in the controversy fueled by the Galician government about the politicization of the protest: “Participation in a demonstration is political; Not participating is politics. Supporting this great crowd is politics. “We have been doing this for many years and we will continue to do it no matter who governs, because we carry it in our soul, we love the sea and we love our job,” he warned. “Whoever” is the next president of the Xunta, Santos Queiruga demanded, “the fishing model” and “the ecological model” must change in order to create “productive estuaries for the people of the sea and for the entire population”: “This are the estuaries.” are cleaned, that seafarers are not stranded if activity is stopped and that the release of dams is regulated in this way [el agua dulce] Don’t kill the seafood.”
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