Trouble in Tulum: How an Eco-Chic Retreat Became a Den of Corruption Oscar Lopez - Newsweek
go to original December 2, 2016

Over the past five years, as Tulum has become increasingly popular and property prices have soared, environmentalists and residents have been battling business moguls and powerful politicians who are colluding to develop the land as quickly as possible. Meanwhile, the city’s infrastructure is floundering, with raw sewage spilling into one of the largest underground river systems in the world. The damage may soon get much worse - a massive new real estate project with a murky past could see Tulum’s population explode tenfold in less than 10 years. As Olmo Torres-Talamante, a local biologist, tells Newsweek, “This is the dark side of paradise.”

The day we spoke, Caro and other evicted hoteliers and landowners met with Luz María Beristain, a state senator who was demanding the federal government intervene in Tulum to halt the forced evictions. As tourists lounged on the beach or swam in the turquoise water, Beristain told the group gathered at the Hemingway Romantic Eco Resort, “I’m ashamed that this is happening in my country.”

The resort’s owner, Paola Sbrizzi, a boisterous Italian woman who has lived in Tulum for 17 years, had invited the senator to speak at her hotel. “I came here on vacation,” Sbrizzi says. “I fell in love, and I never left.” Though she is now a Mexican citizen, many of the hotels and restaurants in Tulum are owned by foreigners - which is why the embassies of France, Italy, Portugal and the Netherlands sent a letter this summer to Mexico’s foreign secretary demanding a “deep and serious investigation” into the forced evictions. “We are living in a climate of terror,” Sbrizzi says. “I’m not taking deposits for reservations, because I don’t know if I’ll still be here in December.”

“We’ve had CEOs and millionaires from Berlin, Paris and New York,” says Henning Schaub from Design Hotels, which manages the Papaya Playa Project hotel. René Redzepi, the chef behind famed Copenhagen restaurant Noma, recently announced he’ll open a pop-up restaurant in town next year, serving meals for $600 a person. This kind of high-priced attention has made Tulum’s real estate worth fighting for and, perhaps, worth killing for.

After a two-hour meeting with the hoteliers, Beristain led us all down the beach to survey the evicted properties. Many remain empty but heavily guarded, and as the group approached one of the hotels, half a dozen men swarmed upon us, some brandishing sticks and heavy chains. They demanded to know what we were doing there, why we were filming. The atmosphere was tense, but we assumed that having an elected official with us offered some protection. “We’re just here to see the great work you’re doing,” said Beristain. “I’m a senator, so please don’t hurt me. It would send you straight to jail.”

“Where do you think I’ve come from?” replied a rough-looking man with a moustache. “I’m not afraid of you.”

As we backed away, one of the men lifted his shirt to make sure we saw the pistol sticking out of his jeans. Beristain led the group farther down the beach. “They’re the new pirates of the Caribbean,” she said.

Read the rest at Newsweek

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