The water crisis in the territory of the Municipalities of the Free Consortium of Agrigento will be at the center of the meeting of the Control Room for the water emergency urgently convened for tomorrow, Thursday 20 June at 3pm, at Palazzo d’Orléans by the President of the Region Renato Schifani.
The current situation will be examined
In particular, the structure will be called upon to examine the current situation in the Agrigento area, evaluate the actions carried out so far and plan further interventions to mitigate the emergency in one of the Sicilian territories most affected by drought. Of the first 20 million euros already allocated by the national government, the Region has allocated around 6 million to Agrigento for wells and pipelines.
Who will be present at the meeting
The meeting will be chaired by President Schifani, in his capacity as commissioner for the water emergency. Also present will be the councilor for Energy and public utilities Roberto Di Mauro and the head of the Sicilian Civil Protection Salvatore Cocina who is entrusted with the coordination of the interventions of the control room. The prefect and the mayor of Agrigento, the representatives of the ATI of Agrigento, of Siciliacque, of the Agrigento Municipalities Water Company and of the Western Sicily Reclamation Consortium, the general secretary of the Basin Authority and the general manager of the department were invited. regional agriculture.
At the beginning of June Agrigento took to the streets to protest against the water crisis
The citizens of Agrigento took to the streets at the beginning of June to protest against the water crisis and the increasingly less frequent water supply shifts. A procession of around five hundred people left from Porta di Ponte to head towards the headquarters of the municipality of Agrigento, shouting “We want water”. Trade unions, associations, “Satira Agrigentina”, Social Cartel and individual citizens participated in the demonstration.
“The tragic water problem concerns all of us and we demonstrate above all for the elderly and those who cannot be here today,” declared Alfonso Cartallinica. “It is a sacrosanct moment to protest for the right to water – said the former deputy Michele Sodano -. 58% of water is lost through city pipes. It is right to affirm the right to water with daily life at risk, agriculture in crisis and the tourism sector on its knees”. “Agrigento is suffering from thirst and the regional government hasn’t lifted a finger – stated the secretary of the CGIL Alfonso Buscemi –. We ask the mayor to promote this great protest and ask for money from the civil protection which must intervene immediately with the watermaker. Let’s put an end to political delays and after the summer we will begin work on the province’s water networks.”
The state of emergency in Sicily
A year of water emergency and extraordinary interventions in Sicily. The Council of Ministers has approved a national state of emergency due to the drought on the island, as requested in recent days by the regional council, for a duration of 12 months, allocating the first 20 million euros, with the possibility of increasing resources in short times already during the implementation of the first interventions. The President of the Region also participated in the meeting at Palazzo Chigi. The Sicilian government has already sent all the necessary documentation to Rome, drawing up a list of the interventions necessary to reduce the effects of the crisis due to the lack of rain. The solutions proposed by the control room, led by the governor and coordinated by the head of the regional civil protection, are differentiated based on the implementation times.
