While friends and relatives of the victims wandered around ground zero trying to find an explanation that no one gave them, the City Council yesterday called a press conference in which it was revealed that the two nightclubs burned down in the early hours of last Sunday, where 13 died people, operated without an activity license and with an order to cease activity since October 2022. A fact that has already begun to trigger a whole series of questions, the main one being the reason why the Inspection did not close both nightclubs. .
“Teatre and Fonda Milagros, the two affected premises, have opened without authorization since the order to cease activity, which was issued in October 2022,” as explained yesterday by Antonio Navarro (of the PP), the current Urban Planning councilor of the City Council of Murcia. The mayor assured that, administratively, the two burned nightclubs were a single establishment, although the owner built a plasterboard wall without permission to turn them into two. Fonda Milagros, the place where all the victims died, “did not exist administratively” and, therefore, escaped municipal control.
Teatre had the license to operate as a nightclub with a kitchen, which was granted in 2008, but in 2019 the owner divided the establishment into the two current spaces. “This fragmentation required a new permit, which the company tried to obtain without success,” they indicated. In January 2022, the previous Urban Planning Councilor, the socialist Andrés Guerrero, issued an order to cease the nightclub's activity, understanding that “the modification of the premises was substantial and required a new license.” On March 8 of the same year, the company presented a legalization project, which to date has not been completed.
Also present at yesterday's appearance was the former mayor of Urban Planning, Andrés Guerrero, who defended his diligence when acting in this case. “The documentation presented by the premises did not correspond to what was requested, and the Inspection was ordered to verify its operation to proceed with its closure,” he recalled. In his opinion, “the only person responsible for what happened is the company, which, despite the communications made to close the premises, ignored them.”
The current Urban Planning Councilor, when asked by journalists, assured that “the administration was not aware that the nightclubs were operating since the closure requirement,” almost a year ago. “Of course, we had no evidence that the store was open,” he concluded.
In this sense, voices are already being heard that question the councilman's version, since "both venues were constantly advertising on social networks, even when they organized parties attended by minors." This is explained by Jesús Jiménez, president of the Federation of Hospitality Entrepreneurs of Murcia, who assures that "everyone knows that these spaces were open and that the entire city passed through there." Navarro finally indicated that “there is no file or administrative document that highlights non-compliance with the closure order.” He adds that "the City Council is investigating what happened to this record, which would be dated October 2022." He also announced that the City Council will appear as a private prosecution in the open judicial procedure: "We are going to appear before the court to act individually against whoever has failed to comply with the cessation order."
Within the immense tragedy, the city has received with joy the confirmation that the five people who were missing after the fire have been found alive. The mayor, José Ballesta, confirmed early yesterday morning that three of them had been located at 7:30 a.m. In the afternoon, the Government Delegation reported that the last of the missing had been found alive.
Firefighters worked throughout the night in the fire area, although police officers have apparently not yet been allowed access due to the risk of the building, which is completely burned, collapsing.
The mayor confirmed that the fire originated in the Fonda Milagros nightclub and spread to Teatre, where customers could be evacuated. He indicated that firefighters had to drill holes in the walls to access the interior due to the impossibility of doing so through the door.
The origin of the incident could be, according to all hypotheses, in a light bulb or, most likely, in one of the flares that were lit that night, as circulated in the videos uploaded to the social networks of some attendees.
The Minister of the Interior, Fernando Grande-Marlaska, announced yesterday that scientific police agents have been sent to Murcia to help in the identification of the deceased. He added that this work aims to give “absolute peace of mind” to the victims' families regarding who each of the deceased is. Regarding the causes of the fire, Grande-Marlaska indicated that we must let “the investigations follow the appropriate course,” since the investigations will determine the causes of this “fatal tragedy.”
