Natalia Puga Marín (Pontevedra)

Marin (Pontevedra)

Updated Saturday, February 17, 2024-1:30 p.m.

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Sunny and sad day of reflection in the Pontevedra town of Marín, home port of the Galician ship

Villa de Pitanxo

that shipwrecked in Newfoundland in February 2022, leaving 21 dead. The second anniversary tribute event coincided with the eve of the regional elections, becoming an involuntary focus of political and media attention. The leaders of the main parties participating in the elections, PP, BNG and PSOE, approached there, and everything pointed to a possible politicization of the event, but finally, fulfilling the wishes of the families, they fled from that tone and it was " by and for families".

Alfonso Rueda (PP), Ana Pontón (BNG) and José Ramón Gómez Besteiro (PSOE) arrived separately, greeted the families and stood among the audience, close, but without the three getting together at any time. An attitude that contrasted with the one that everyone adopted with their relatives, with whom everyone was close and affectionate, blending in with the sad atmosphere marked by tears and mourning that was experienced on Paseo Antonio Blanco in Marín.

The nationalist and socialist leaders, the first to arrive, did greet each other affectionately and chatted for a brief moment, but not with the 'popular' candidate. At one point during the event, Pontón approached Rueda and they shook hands, but the meeting was cold. Besteiro and the PP candidate did not even greet each other, despite being a few centimeters away from each other.

The three wanted to dedicate the day of reflection to accompanying the families of this shipwreck that shocked Galician society on February 15, but remaining in the background, as the families had expressly requested, despite the fact that it even meant skipping the protocol.

Once the floral tribute to the protagonists of the event was over, they joined in. Alfonso Rueda, as institutional representative of the Xunta de Galicia, was the first, accompanied by the 'popular' mayor of Marín, María Ramallo, and delivered a centerpiece of white roses. Also the delegate and subdelegate of the Government, Pedro Blanco and Abel Losada, exercising their institutional positions, placed a centerpiece of flowers in front of the plaque honoring the 21 deceased.

Behind them, with a white rose in their hand, were Pontón, Besteiro, the nationalist mayors of Pontevedra and Bueu; the president of the Galician PSOE, Carmela Silva; and multiple officials from the PP and the BNG, including MEP Ana Miranda (BNG), who raised the voice of families in Brussels.

The spokesperson for the families, María José de Pazo, thanked everyone for their attitude, "respectful because it is what the families wanted", because "in this act, the protocols have been left behind and the protocol was the 21 of Villa de Pitanxo and everything it means." She had asked for it at the beginning of the event and she had conveyed it to the match teams days ago.

De Pazo thanked the "commitment" shown by PP, BNG and PSOE with this act, but also asked that it not be a matter of one day and a day of reflection. "Let it not be a commitment just for today. Let it transcend," he asked them, while conveying a request, respected by all, that the end of this tribute, in which families threw flowers into the sea, remain in the strictest privacy.

He also took the opportunity, on behalf of all the families, to insist on his demand for "Justice and clarification of the causes" of the shipwreck and to thank Samuel Kwesi, the sailor from Ghana who, together with the skipper and his nephew, , survived the sinking, and helped the investigation of what happened.. "You are our lighthouse. You are their voice, you always have been and we know you always will be," he thanked him, to applause. "We could be applauding for a whole week."

Rueda, Pontón and Besteiro left as they arrived, separately, without greeting each other, but surrounded by their people. The day of reflection will bring everyone together again at night, in the match between RC Celta and Barcelona FC at the Balaídos stadium in Vigo.