The Parliament of Andalusia today approves a bill that will legitimize the exploitation of water from the National Park for agricultural use, some of which have been illegal for decades. This initiative, which will foreseeably go ahead today in the plenary session of the Andalusian Parliament because it is proposed by the PP (with an absolute majority in the chamber) and Vox, starts working with the vast majority of political groups against it, without taking into account the opinion of the Doñana Participation Council, without reports that support it and with possible sanctions from the European Union, according to what all the parliamentary groups have denounced this morning except for those who propose it.
"This plenary session is a before and after in the credibility of Moreno Bonilla," says Juan Espadas, leader of the PSOE in Andalusia, who also asks the president of the Board to "assume responsibility" if there is a legal response from Europe .
"This proposal breaks the consensus framework achieved in 2014" with the Strawberry Pact, says Espadas, which was the agreement that "allowed the European Union to close the sanctioning procedure" for the status of the National Park. With this initiative, what Moreno Bonilla will achieve is "reopening the water war in Doñana". "This end point law opens Pandora's box," says Espadas.
With this bill, which the PP claims is for the reorganization of the territory, many farmers who have been using Doñana's water for years and even decades illegally could be granted amnesty. But with what water will these farms be irrigated if the National Pancake is dry? According to the popular ones, it would have to be done when the works for the transfer of the Tinto-Odiel-Piedras materialize, which are the responsibility of the State, affirms Toni Martín of the Popular Group, who assures La Vanguardia that no farmer who receives the irrigation permit with this law will to get water until there is no transfer.
The general feeling of the rest of the parliamentary groups that have appeared today in Parliament was the same. Adelante Andalucía reproached the popular that "the law is a fake, absolutely false and a liar", alluding to the statements of the PP that ensure that it will not do any harm to the National Park or that the law is not about water but about territories . “Moreno Bonilla is going to become the President of the Board that is going to dry Doñana”, they affirm.
From the PP they continue to insist that it has nothing to do with water, but with the "land planning of the Huelva county municipality" and that, in any case, there is always talk of irrigation with surface water (not aquifers). . "It is not true that only surface water will be used because article 23 of the proposition states that unless the competent authorities establish a different origin," explains Inmaculada Nieto on behalf of Por Andalucía. When asked about this, Toni Martín Iglesias of the PP responded to the journalists present that "it is not that the door is left open, but that we cannot legislate on something in which we have no competence."
In this proposal there is "not a single word, not a single article, not a single epigraph that involves the slightest environmental damage" for Doñana, Martín adds.
For his part, Vox spokesman Manuel Gavira vehemently explained that the text does not touch the aquifers. "That people find out once and for all, that they do not confuse, that they do not mess up the bill," he snapped.
Among the main reproaches that have been made to this bill and to the PP that propose it are doing it knowing the possible European sanctions, which already opened a disciplinary file that was closed in 2014 when a general consensus was reached called the Pact Strawberry because it especially affects producers of red fruits.
In addition, "All the reports have been skipped, which would be absolutely negative" they emphasize from Adelante Andalucía. For their part, from Por Andalucía they wondered "who is going to pay the piper if the sanction materializes for non-compliance with the judgment of the Court of Justice of the European Union or the damage done to legal agricultural production in the area of park and the unprecedented ecological damage". "Today marks a month since the EU Commission said that this text was completely contrary to compliance with the sentence and that it would put all the measures at its disposal" to comply with it.
