In an annual fertility ritual, the mayor of San Pedro Huamelula, Oaxaca, has once again married a lizard.
The ritual, which is celebrated every year near the end of June on the town’s patron saint day, saw Mayor Virgilio Fuentes wed “the Lizard Princess,” who is believed to be a representation of a female deity of the region’s Huave people.
According to local officials and academics, the union symbolizes the balance between man and nature and is thought to be able to bestow rain and good harvests on the Isthmus of Tehuantepec community. Additionally, the ceremony also reaffirms a pact of brotherhood between the Huave and Chontal peoples.
To prepare for the wedding, the Lizard Princess — actually a crocodile — is baptized in the San Pedro Apóstol church before she is dressed in a white wedding dress and crowned with a wreath of flowers. A community leader then takes over, cradling the bride in her arms and dancing her door to door through the pueblo, accompanied by a traditional band.
At the same time, residents don costumes and accompany the wedding procession through the town. Before entering municipal headquarters, the bride’s party pauses briefly for the town elders to cast fishing nets to ask for permission to marry off the reptilian damsel.
The bride in her wedding dress — and snout tied shut.
Once inside, city council members gather round to witness the proceedings, where the mayor lays eyes upon his bride for the first time in her wedding dress. Man and crocodile then consummate their union with a kiss.
The marriage sealed, the mayor rushes out of city hall to dance in a display of contentment before the whole pueblo, officially closing the ceremony — until next year.
Huge quantities of sargassum have invaded the coastline of southern Quintana Roo this week, and plenty more is predicted to arrive in the coming weeks.
Around 300 kilometers of beaches between Tulum and Xcalak are affected by the seaweed’s arrival, which was predicted by the Cancún sargassum monitoring network last week and began early Monday morning.
Water at beaches such as Boca Paila, Sian Kan, Punta Yuyum, Zamach, Punta Allen, Uvero, Puerto Bravo and Mahahual is stained brown due to the large presence of sargassum.
Off the coast of Xcalak – a small town near the border with Belize – aerial images show that the water is currently covered with a layer of coffee-colored foam, which makes the sea look more like a swamp.
The scene is similar at Tulum, where the normally turquoise waters have turned a shade of murky brown and the fetid odors of decomposing sargassum linger over the town’s beaches.
The Sargassum Monitoring Network’s map as of yesterday. Red indicates sargassum in excessive quantities, orange is abundant, yellow moderate and green low.
Satellite images show that a lot of the Caribbean Sea between the Quintana Roo coastline and Jamaica is covered with the macroalgae, much of which is expected to drift to the state’s south.
By the end of the 2019 sargassum season, five times the quantity of seaweed that washed up on beaches last year is predicted to have arrived.
Esteban Amaro, a marine biologist and chief of the monitoring network, told the newspaper Milenio that the large quantities of sargassum are the result of an increase of nutrients in the sea and higher than normal water temperatures due to climate change.
“We have [water] temperatures between two and three degrees above average,” he said.
Amaro said that only minimal amounts of sargassum will reach coastal locations in the north of Quintana Roo such as Cancún, Isla Mujeres, Puerto Morelos and Playa del Carmen, whereas beaches between Tulum and Xcalak will continue to experience “high-intensity arrivals” of the weed.
Ocean currents dictate where the seaweed ends up, he explained.
For hotel owners, the cost of keeping beaches clean has become “unsustainable,” according to an industry leader. Some are spending as much as 900,000 pesos (US $47,000) a month to ensure that beaches meet the expectations of tourists.
However, Tulum Hotel Association president David Ortiz said that the capacity to collect the unwelcome seaweed will be exceeded by the latest sargassum invasion.
Ortiz also said that hotel owners would be prepared to pay a special sargassum tax if they knew that their money would be used wisely.
“There is already the federal land-maritime zone payment that hotel owners with beach [access] pay and there is also the accommodation tax . . . Why not design a new tax? I think that we would be open to it as long as there is timely management of this problem.”
Cell phone theft is on the rise in Mexico City: the Attorney General’s Office (PGJ) investigated 21,722 cases in 2018, an average of 60 cell phones stolen every day.
There were significantly fewer incidents the previous year: a total of 14,141 cases for an average of 39 phones stolen daily in 2017. In 2016, 7,314 cell phones were reported stolen, an average of 20 a day.
Since 2016, the frequency of cell phone theft has shot up by 197%.
Thefts conducted using violence far outweighed those in which force was not used last year, and the use of violence has become far more prevalent than it was in 2016.
Last year, cell phone theft with violence was the fourth most common crime in Mexico City behind general larceny in which 14,487 cases were investigated, non-violent robbery of businesses — 15,138 cases and domestic violence — 19,974 cases.
However, authorities have also cracked down on some cell phone thieves.
Yesterday, the Mexico City Metro announced the arrest of “El Chocorrol,” the suspected leader of a band of thieves who operated in Tacuba Station on Line 2. He was identified by police on security cameras.
Authorities said the group selected their victims during rush hour. One gang member would push and shove the unwitting commuter, while another took advantage of the distraction to relieve him of his cell phone or wallet.
Officials continue to search for another four gang members. In the meantime, they urged citizens who believed they might have been robbed by El Chocorrol to report the crime to police as evidence.
At least 25 people who were kidnapped on Tuesday night from a call center in Cancún have been rescued and are in good health, according to Quintana Roo Public Security Secretary Alberto Capella.
Capella had previously reported the disappearance of 22 people at the call center, located at 39 Avenida Santa Fe in Supermanzana 524, noting that it had been preceded by an “unusual movement of people in a business,” and that it had taken place “without violence or use of firearms.”
According to witnesses who spoke to the media, a group of at least four armed people arrived at the building shortly after 10:00pm and forced a group of people from inside the building to leave aboard two vehicles.
They allegedly stole three cars and a motorcycle from the company, which sells vacation homes by phone.
There were 15 young people and three women among those who were kidnapped.
According to tweets from the Quintana Roo Attorney General’s Office, the first lines of investigation were about a disagreement between the two partners of the company over payment and labor conditions.
Capella said that his office will release more information about the case shortly.
Before the victims were rescued, President López Obrador acknowledged the event in his morning press conference, but would not call it a kidnapping.
“We still can’t talk about kidnapping,” he said. “It’s about two gangs, two groups who have some kind of activity that’s in dispute, so we’re not treating it as a kidnapping in the general sense, but rather as a conflict between two groups.”
Amid international criticism, the Federal Electricity Commission (CFE) announced yesterday that it had filed requests for arbitration in courts in the United Kingdom and France to annul clauses in seven gas pipeline contracts.
The CFE said it had lodged preliminary claims to void certain clauses in contracts with the companies Fermaca, Carso, IEnova and TC Energy (formerly TransCanada Corporation).
The public utility said last week that it wished to negotiate a “fairer” outcome to contract disputes. President López Obrador has described the terms of the contracts with the pipeline construction companies as “abusive” to the state.
The CFE has previously said that it will have to pay 16 billion pesos (US $840 million) to the operators of the seven pipelines this year even though the projects are not yet operational as they have faced delays due to community opposition.
The London Court of International Arbitration has been asked to hear six cases, while the mediation of the International Court of Arbitration in Paris has been sought in one.
The legal action relates to contracts for the pipelines Tuxpan-Tula (TC Energy); Tula-Villa de Reyes (TC Energy); Samalayuca-Sásabe (Carso); Guaymas-El Oro (IEnova); La Laguna-Aguascalientes (Fermaca); Villa de Reyes-Aguascalientes-Guadalajara (Fermaca); and Texas-Tuxpan (TC Energy/IEnova).
Earlier yesterday, the United States Chamber of Commerce (USCC) criticized the CFE for seeking to nullify clauses in the contract for the submarine gas line between Texas and Tuxpan, Veracruz, a US $2.5-billion project that was completed last month.
The USCC said in a statement that President López Obrador pledged at the United States-Mexico CEO Dialogue in Mérida, Yucatán, earlier this year, to honor existing contracts.
It also said that there are “few factors more critical to investment and economic growth than the legal certainty and predictability fostered by the respect for the rule of law.”
“For these reasons, we are concerned by CFE’s decision to seek arbitration to nullify several key terms of the contract with the owners of the Sur de Texas-Tuxpan pipeline, a key infrastructure project that would contribute to economic development and job creation in the states of southern Mexico,” the USCC said.
“This action risks sending a negative signal to U.S. and other international investors about the business and investment climate in Mexico. We therefore urge CFE and the government of Mexico to reconsider this decision and to observe the president’s pledge to honor the sanctity of existing contracts.”
Pierre Alarie charged that the move showed that “despite López Obrador’s statements, Mexico doesn’t want to respect gas pipeline contracts.”
Fitch Ratings said the pursuit of arbitration was “credit-negative” for the CFE, the companies involved and the energy sector in general.
The president said last week that the government would seek to reach an agreement with Canada’s TC Energy, while the CFE announced yesterday that it had begun talks with Fermaca.
“All the companies have agreed to talk about the contracts. Today we met with Fermaca to determine how to negotiate,” said CFE spokesman Luis Bravo.
He added that the discussions will take place in parallel to the international arbitration process. The two parties agreed to meet again on July 12.
Today, Carlos Salazar Lomelín, president of the Business Coordinating Council, a leading private sector group, said that he had reached an agreement with López Obrador to hold conciliation sessions between representatives of the government and the four companies subject to the CFE legal action.
“We had a very friendly meeting with the president . . . [and] we came to the conclusion that we are going to favor dialogue . . . we’re going to form a conciliation board to try to put aside the legal problem and to try to reach a solution that benefits everyone,” he said.
The business leader explained that the president will decide who represents the government and that he and Mexican Business Council president Antonio del Valle will put together a team to act in the interests of Fermaca, Carso, IEnova and TC Energy.
Although Salazar acknowledged that the CFE will continue to pursue the international arbitration processes it has initiated, he asserted that “we’re going to try to find meeting points instead of being in a legal dispute that doesn’t benefit anyone.”
The government of Baja California Sur has announced that the construction of a US $192-million liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal will begin in August at the port of Pichilingue, La Paz.
To be operated by New Fortress Energy, a United States developer and operator of LNG energy projects, the plant should be ready to receive its first shipment of fuel in July 2020, said Governor Carlos Mendoza Davis.
He described LNG as a cheaper and cleaner alternative for electric power generation, and (the new LNG facility) should have important repercussions in the state.”
Boats, trucks, taxis and all kinds of vehicles can be converted to burn the fuel, along with the Federal Electricity Commission’s generation plants, the governor said.
New Fortress Energy CEO Wesley Edens explained that LNG transportation is among the safest in the world, and that the fuel should become a catalyst for the state’s economic growth.
The Iztapalapa neighborhood where the pitbull attack occurred.
A toddler died yesterday after being attacked by a pitbull in Iztapalapa, Mexico City.
Witnesses said the young boy, almost 2 years old, climbed to the roof of a house with his mother when he was attacked by the dog, which reportedly lived on the roof and was kept tied up at all times.
The dog bit the youngster several times. When paramedics arrived he was pronounced dead.
Borough authorities took the owner of the dog into custody and the dog was secured by the animal services agency Agatan.
Animal rights organization Mundo Patitas A.C. lamented the attack, stressing that the dog was an innocent being that had been deprived of the most basic rights, and whose abuse, neglect and confinement atop a roof had taken its toll on an innocent child.
A security analyst doesn't expect the National Guard to make much difference: there have been almost as many military personnel doing the same thing without success.
An average of 94 homicides per day made the first half of the year the most violent on record, and security specialists are not optimistic that things will improve in the final six months of 2019.
There were 17,065 victims of homicide and femicide between January and June, according to National Public Security System statistics for the first five months of the year combined with figures for June that were published daily by the Secretariat of Security and Citizens Protection (SSPC).
When the 2,879 homicides recorded in December are added to the murder figures for this year, the total number of victims of violent deaths since President López Obrador took office is almost 20,000.
If the SSPC trend of underestimating homicide figures by 20% occurred again in June, not only will the total number of murders during López Obrador’s government exceed 20,000 but last month will go down as the most violent on record with more than 3,000 victims.
“The last year of [the administration of] former president Enrique Peña Nieto was bad in terms of the crime rate but 2019 is on the path to being [even] worse,” said security specialist Ricardo Márquez Blas.
“. . . It’s important to understand that we’re doing worse [in security] than the worst year [on record],” he added.
The states that have recorded the highest number of homicides during the seven months the government has been in office are Guanajuato, México state, Jalisco, Baja California, Chihuahua, Veracruz, Mexico City and Guerrero.
The Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG), considered Mexico’s most powerful criminal organization, and the Santa Rosa de Lima Cartel are engaged in a turf war in Guanajuato to control fuel theft, extortion and kidnapping.
In México state, which currently ranks as the second most violent entity in the country, the CJNG, the Familia Michoacana, the Caballeros Templarios, the Gulf Cartel and the Nuevo Imperio gang are all fighting to control the drug trafficking trade, according to a report in the newspaper El Universal.
With cartel wars also raging in other states, Márquez believes that the murder rate will not decline by October, the month by which López Obrador forecast that the government’s security strategy will begin to yield results.
Flanked by the heads of the army and navy, the president inspects the National Guard on Monday. Behind them is Security Secretary Alfonso Durazo.
“In October, when we reach six months [since the president’s promise], there will be no essential downward change in terms of the crime rate, particularly for homicides. It’s going to continue, the statistics show that,” he said.
The security expert challenged the president’s claim that the deployment of 70,000 National Guard troops will improve the security situation, stating that “there were already 63,000 elements of the armed forces [engaged] in security tasks and that hasn’t had any positive impact.”
Márquez added that “the best example” of the failure of military personnel – which also make up the majority of National Guard members – to combat crime is Tijuana, Baja California.
“Kidnapping and femicides have gone up, and that has to do with the lack of resources. There is no priority in terms of investing [ in security] . . .” he said.
The director of the National Citizens’ Observatory, a crime watch group, told El Universal that the security situation has been “serious for a long time” and that a strategy with well-defined actions is needed to combat it. However, Francisco Rivas charged that the government hasn’t presented any such strategy.
“The problem is that this government doesn’t have a strategy, they’ve [tried to] explain . . . that there is a strategy but the truth is that it cannot be confirmed that one exists,” he said.
López Obrador has only shown “good intentions and a series of naiveties,” Rivas charged. “. . . His social policy, as it is set up, will not be able to reduce homicides . . .”
Jorge Alberto Lara Rivera, an academic at the National Institute of Criminal Sciences and a former assistant prosecutor at the federal Attorney General’s Office, charged that members of the government are not all on the same page with regards to security.
In contrast, organized crime groups understand it “perfectly” well, he said, adding that if the government doesn’t design adequate strategies to combat them “we’re going to continue seeing the same results.”
Tequila producers say that rising demand and increases in the price of agave are to blame for the drink getting more expensive over the last four years.
According to data from Iscam, a Mexican company that tracks prices of consumer goods, a bottle of tequila costs on average 438 pesos (US $23), 23% more than in 2015.
José Antonio Cebeira, an analyst at Actinver, a financial services company, told the newspaper El Financiero that one of the factors pushing up the price of tequila is rising demand for other agave products, like agave syrup.
“The causes are a strong demand for tequila which, because of the denomination of origin, can only be produced in some regions,” he said. “And also the success of agave syrup and sweeteners on the international level, all of this is pushing up the price of agave.”
The denomination of origin, which allows tequila to be made only from agave produced in five states, and the fact that agave plants can take as long as seven years to mature, limits the supply of the plant and makes it difficult for growers to respond to rising demand.
And agave is getting more expensive much faster than tequila. According to Carlos Riggen, professor of business at the Monterrey Technological Institute, the price of a kilo of agave went up eightfold over the past five years, from 3 pesos to 26.
Agave represents more than 60% of the cost of making tequila. So even as tequila has been getting more expensive, profit margins for tequila companies have declined an average of 50% over the last five years. Becle, Diageo and Brown-Forman, which own the brands José Cuervo, Don Julio and Herradura, are all reporting pressure on their margins because of the rising price of agave.
But many tequila companies have been making up for declining profit margins with increased sales. According to Mexico’s national statistics institute, Inegi, tequila makers produced 85.5 million liters in the first quarter of 2019, 48.4% more than in the same period five years ago.
The Seashell House, an Airbnb rental on Isla Mujeres, Quintana Roo.
Airbnb brought five million international travelers to Mexico in 2018, according to a company document.
Based on internal surveys and data analysis, the document also revealed that Airbnb travelers in Mexico had a direct economic impact of US $2.7 billion last year, including money spent directly through the platform as well as on restaurants and other activities.
Across the world, Airbnb travel generated US $100 billion in 2018.
The company said a significant part of the money spent by travelers is connected to recommendations made by hosts. The report notes that 83% of Mexican hosts who were polled said they recommend cafes and restaurants to their guests, while 47% recommend daytrips and 66% recommend cultural activities. Four out of five Mexican hosts received five-star ratings, the highest on the platform.
Mexico saw more Airbnb revenues than any other Latin American country, and was in ninth place on the global ranking, below countries including the United States, France, Spain, Italy and the United Kingdom. Those five countries together accounted for 63.5% of the total economic impact of Airbnb in 2018.
The report also showed a significant increase in Airbnb trips to lesser-known destinations like Moldova, Vanuatu and New Caledonia.
An Airbnb press release stated that hosts keep an average of 97% of the price paid by their guests, but spend around 51% of what they earn on maintaining and paying for their homes.
