On the seventh anniversary of the collapse of a road into quarries in Borba, Évora district, Zero has claimed in a statement that “the main conclusion is the political failure to ensure greater safety and responsibility in the extractive sector”.
“Seven years have passed since the accident, and although two public consultations have been held for the new decree-law intended to regulate the Quarry Law (Law No. 54/2015), the bill inexplicably remains shelved,” the association pointed out.
On November 19, 2018, a 100-meter section of the Municipal Road 255, between Borba and Vila Viçosa, collapsed due to a large landslide of rocks, marble blocks, and earth into two quarries, resulting in five deaths.
In the statement, Zero highlighted that the country “continues to govern quarry exploitation with an obsolete legal framework that is 18 years old,” which “fails to provide the minimum guarantees for responsible and sustainable exploitation.”
“It neither sufficiently safeguards the safety of people and property nor the environmental protection and enhancement of territories,” it said, demanding “the swift approval of the new decree-law for the Quarry Law to finally be updated.”
Zero, which claimed to have sought clarification from the government without response, stated that the Borba accident “exposed the historical non-compliance, lack of control, and imminent risk that has always characterized this sector.”
“In this context, the government has consistently been complicit with a sector that has always been reactive rather than proactive in its regulation,” it accused, citing the Extraordinary Scheme for the Regularization of Economic Activities as an example.
Recalling that this mechanism, implemented between 2015 and 2017, aimed “to extraordinarily legalize quarries in an irregular situation,” the environmental association regretted that “once again” systematic problems, such as environmental liabilities and safety gaps, have not been resolved.
The new decree-law “in no way resolves all of the sector’s problems, failing to address the immense environmental liabilities generated by abandoned quarries and providing insufficient minimum protection distances, along with weak penalties for non-compliance with environmental recovery,” it admitted.
However, Zero argued, “it is a positive and necessary step for the sector, incorporating important elements such as the National Quarry Registry, the Single Quarry Platform (PUP), and the mandatory restoration and rehabilitation of the area concurrently with extraction.”
In the statement, Ricardo Filipe, who monitors mining for the association, stated, “It is inadmissible that seven years after a tragedy that exposed the law’s weaknesses, the new legal framework remains blocked.”
“The new Quarry Law, despite having many aspects to improve, is a step forward that must be implemented now to protect people and territories,” he argued.
The Borba accident led to the deaths of two workers from a marble extraction company at an active quarry and three other men in two vehicles that fell into the water-filled inactive quarry.
In February of this year, the Évora Court acquitted all six defendants in the case of all charges, with an appeal by the Public Prosecutor’s Office pending.
