| project of the Algar River, which I cannot get my head around. This river and the Sierra de Aitana are the barrier between too arid or too wet climate. You cannot develop it. I did not came here to live in a suburb of Benidorm. And how do you think Altea has received the environmentalists? In Altea there was always a concern about ecology. The germ was there, but we have also suffered from indifference plus contempt and insults. We have received complaints (denuncias) on instructions from Ortiz in order to fine us. They have tried to remove us economically. But while the Alteanos looked like they had lost. Now there are very few who have an allotment with a little house (caseta) whereas before it was the norm. And alsothey have seen how they were going to lose the river. Our movement has been successful because people have come to realise that those who were advocating such urbanising actions, entered the townhall with nothing, and have left after lining the pockets of themselves and their families. These people defend their own economic interests. We, however, hope for a fight that does not involve economic returns, but on the contrary, we want the world to be better for everyone. |
| ECOLOGISTAS EN ACCIÓN interview continues: next page... |
| Where are you from? I was born in Valencia and grew up in Andilla, a village in La Serrania de Valencia. What is your professional background? I have worked in factories, at a tractor factory, works contracts office, but I needed to work in contact with nature and I obtained a position as Forest Fireman at the Rural Emergency Brigade for the Generalitat Valenciana. |
| How did you come to be in Altea? It was my girlfriend's work, We discovered Altea and we had no doubts. This place is a paradise because it has the charm of a mountain village bordered by the sea. We bought a small apartment in '94 and established oursleves. We have 2 "Altean" children, Robert 10 and Anna 6. |
| When and how did your interest in ecology begin? I was a hunter, I would have been about 15 years old when I met 2 ornithologists with whom I had a long chat. From there I began to hate myself for hunting animals, especially when I realized that I killed birds that were disappearing and that there was another way to interact with nature, but I want to qualify that by saying that there are great hunters who are environmentalists. There is an ancestral aspect to it. You enter nature at a very strong level. |
| Interview: Robert Rubio, spokesperson for ECOLOGISTAS EN ACCIÓN |
| Those who pick mushrooms by the smell know if the location is good or bad. The hunter is the same. Also there are the TV programmes of the hunter Rodriguez de la Fuente, who did such good work in his time and also my father, who never applied chemicals to the land. |
| And what about the militancy of Ecologists in Action? It was here in Altea and because of the attitudes of Miguel Ortiz and Jacinto Mulet, because you cannot and should not urbanise everything. This was a great town to live in. One could open the balcony and see a beautiful garden, but now that has been lost. Today, in that same house there is now a barren plot and you have to go to Montahud to find an orchard. Later we would have seen the expansion of the marina and the entire development |
