Ten days after the floods in Belgium, the controversies multiply
The Belgian city of Spa was flooded by the torrential rains that hit Europe between Tuesday 14 and Thursday 16 July 2021 in the morning.
AP - Valentin Bianchi
Text by: RFI Follow
3 min
Belgian newspapers and social networks are full of questions on the causes of the floods that recently hit the country, but also on their management, and fuel as many controversies.
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With our correspondent in Brussels,
Pierre Bénazet
For part of Belgian opinion, politicians have found an unstoppable excuse to discard by blaming climate change.
Floods from July 14 to 16 left
36 people dead in the country, according to the latest report, with 11 people still missing.
All these victims resided in the east of Wallonia, along the valleys of the Meuse and especially the Vesdre where the inhabitants are still in the midst of clearing the rubble, and where some accuse the authorities of having taken too long to react after the first alerts.
Slow relief
The latest controversy concerns the management of the Vesdre dam in Eupen.
The most devastated localities such as Verviers, Pépinster, or Chaudfontaine are all downstream of this dam.
The waterways administration is accused of not having emptied the dam from the first flood alerts.
The minister responsible for waterways in Wallonia, Philippe Henry, says that even if it had been empty before the floods, the dam would not have been enough, because the most intense rainfall occurred downstream.
Why not have emptied the Eupen dam preventively?
The explanation of the Walloon Minister Philippe Henry https://t.co/NlrV4y0OAC
- RTL info (@rtlinfo) July 20, 2021
The other accusation of the slowness of the reaction still concerns this valley of the Vesdre, with a red flood alert sent on July 14 at 6 a.m. to the crisis center and which only resulted in first evacuations six to seven. hours later.
On this point, no explanation, and the controversy could swell.
Finally, there is the reorganization of civil protection services that took place in 2017 under the previous federal government.
This reorganization mainly closed barracks and reduced the number of emergency services according to accusations made on the first day of the flood by the Minister President of Wallonia.
► See also: Belgium: national day of mourning for the victims of the floods
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