«THE PEOPLE WERE WORTH NOTHING»
Jánovas, Lavelilla, Lacort and 14 other villages in the Valley of Ara in the Spanish Pyrenees were destroyed in the sixties to build a dam that finally was never constructed. A conflict of interests between the administration and the company Iberduero (today Iberdrola) together with doubts about its profitability, caused delays in its construction. In spite of that, the inhabitants of the affected villages were obliged to abandon their homes, which were dynamited, even when there were still families in the neighbourhoods. Their crops and harvest were burned, local infrastructure was destroyed and those who resisted were harassed and threatened.
Eventually only the Garcés family resisted and remained alone in Jànovas for 20 years. In 2001, after persevering in their fight and with the general reaction in the whole region of Sobrarbe, led by the Association River Ara, a negative environmental report led to the project being rejected.
Today the people affected, their children and their grandchildren are starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel after 50 years. The government, finally, has opened a legal process of returning land and property. In spite of this the company which bought the rights from Iberdrola, Endesa, continues in its attempt to prevent this beautiful valley from being recuperated, destroyed in its day for nothing.
Texts: Marisancho Menjón
Photography: Tove Heiskel
