She made the remarks during her visit to the 25th Cella Potato Fair, where she also recalled that Teruel province had suffered major wildfires this summer, particularly in Matarraña and around Ejulve. “Wildfires do not understand political affiliation,” the Socialist leader said, expressing hope that Azcón would accept this attempt to bring positions closer together. However, she said the Aragonese president’s initial response to the Socialist proposal “was not very encouraging.”
The secretary general of the PSOE in Aragon argued that the agreement must be accompanied by “more resources” and, especially, by “concrete measures.” In this regard, she viewed the Aragonese government’s announcement that it would allocate 50 million euros to prevention and firefighting positively, but warned that “announcing investments is just as important as actually implementing them.”
Pilar Alegría also called for aid to reach farmers who directly assisted in fighting the fires as soon as possible, making their own equipment and machinery available and paying out of pocket for expenses such as fuel, “without having received any aid from the Aragonese government so far,” she said. “There are many announcements, but on the other hand, there is a great deal of reality,” she warned.
The Socialist leader also said that, given its forested area, Aragon has “one of the worst ratios of available resources for tackling wildfires.” In her view, this situation “makes it necessary to strengthen resources and planning so we are better prepared for future incidents.”
25 YEARS OF THE CELLA POTATO FAIR
Alégria made these remarks during her visit to the 25th Cella Potato Fair, where she congratulated local residents for having successfully used “one of the municipality’s most characteristic products” for 25 years to generate economic activity and turn it into an event capable of attracting visitors from different parts of Aragon.
She gave special recognition to the work of volunteers and groups such as the Campo La Fuente Cooperative, the Housewives’ Association and pensioners, as well as all the people of Cella who make each edition of the fair possible. Alegría also highlighted the preparation of hundreds of Spanish omelets over the weekend and the traditional stew made each year by Victoria, of which nearly 3,000 servings are distributed.
Finally, she praised Cella’s Agria variety of potato, which she described as the “golden diamond,” and congratulated the municipality for maintaining and expanding for a quarter of a century a fair built around one of its most representative products.
