The contractors of the destroyed buildings are arrested, multiple of them at a time, and by the order of the ministry, they are trying to demolish the public building with a record of damage. If the lawyers in the region did not arrive, they will use the darkness of a city they left under the rubble to cover up their crimes.
Those who are really responsible are clear.
Those who are responsible are those who proposed zoning amnesty laws, and all deputies who took part in the entire legislative process, from the bourgeois opposition to the government, and voted yes to these laws.
Those who are responsible are the former and new mayors, the zoning directors and commissions of the municipalities, who have signed the zoning permits for buildings not resistant to the earthquake.
Those who are responsible are the former and new ministers of environmental and urban planning, provincial directors, and all people involved in the bureaucratic process.
Those who are responsible are in the Palace.
Just as we took action as soon as we heard the news of the earthquake, without waiting for another savior aside from each other, we must ensure that all those responsible are brought to justice in order to finally remove this wreckage that has been placed on us by the state.
But not in show trials that try to quell our anger by arresting three or five contractors.
Not with investigations that is carried out by the ministry that ordered the demolition of the building where the evidence showing those who are responsible of the earthquake was kept.
Earthquake courts should be established. All those responsible should be prosecuted.
• A coordination should be established in which bar associations, professional chambers, disaster coordination centers formed by volunteers, ecology and urban organizations, health organizations and labor organizations come together. This coordination should organize the trial process of those responsible in all its dimensions.
• With the contribution of the voluntary disaster coordination centers working in the region, the buildings that are damaged and the debris that will be taken as sample should be determined.
• It is clear that the state officials who caused and allowed this destruction will not be impartial in any way.
For the preparatory phase, damage assessment studies, samples taken from the wreckage, retrospective inspection of the zoning permits, collection of evidence etc. should be carried out by lawyers, engineers and architects determined by bar associations and chambers.
• The investigation process cannot be left only to the prosecutor’s office. If we do not want indictments with a content that if a law faculty student prepared it they’d will fail the course, we should be involved in this process with commissions formed by lawyers working in the fields of zoning law and criminal law .
• The data collected during the investigation process should be disclosed to the public by bar associations and professional organizations throughout the process.
• We who have been mobilized since the first day of the earthquake should follow the process and grow the established solidarity, from the beginning of this process to its effective continuation, in the courtroom, in front of the courthouse, on the street, until all those responsible receive the punishment they deserve.
If we don’t want to be buried under this rubble again, we must ensure that all those responsible are punished. We can only do this with our organized power. Just as we, as workers, women and students, help each other to survive today and increase solidarity, we must continue and expand this struggle together from now on.
