On Saturday, January 21, neighbors from Montebello, Monte Albán, Montecristo, Sol Campestre, and members of the group Colonos Montes Unidos de Mérida once again demonstrated against the Infiniti development being built in the north of the city of Mérida.
According to the protesters, they have been fighting for more than a year against this housing complex which, according to them, does not comply with the municipal regulations contemplated in the Municipal Urban Development Program (PMDU).
The attendees gathered at Kalia Park, marched on Avenida Cámara de Comercio, then stood for a moment in front of the Infiniti development.
“No more developments, no more towers, but more green areas”; “free spaces, we want dignified spaces to live in“, “mountains united will never be defeated” and “no more swaps” were some of the slogans of the demonstrators.
This project, said the neighbors, exceeds the land occupation coefficient, since only 27,200 m² of construction footprint would have to be authorized, and 140,217.50 m² is approved.
“It does not fulfill the minimum green areas, nor the minimum permeable areas allowed, since it has two levels of subway basements and there is no permeability, which can cause flooding in the area,” warned the protesters.
In addition, they detailed, it does not comply with the necessary characteristics for the urban zone, besides that it will generate road chaos among other problems; for which they accuse that there is corruption on the part of the municipal authorities in this case.
“It is impossible that the city council does not take care of its citizens, when it should be there to take care of its citizens, not private interests”, they indicated.
They demand that the mayor of Merida, Renan Barrera Concha, and the city council attend to their demands and that what is allowed by law be built.
In June 2022, the Fourth District Court in the state of Yucatán granted a definitive suspension of the construction of the Infiniti Mérida real estate development, located on Avenida Cámara de Comercio, in the Monterreal subdivision. With this, the authorities should have ordered a halt to the construction of this project.
However, the protesters indicated that the judge asked them for an amount of 3 million pesos in order to maintain the suspension during the judicial process, but since they did not have the amount, the work on the development continued.
“We demand that the law be respected, the real estate development does not comply with the Municipal Development Program, we have a series of points that we have already demonstrated that it does not comply with the heights, density, land use, construction; due to the type of roads, it does not comply”, they stated.
The only thing we are asking is that they fulfill the Municipal Development Program that they themselves imposed, they added.
As to whether they have had any contact with the municipal authorities, they indicated that “the city council has not said anything to us, part of what we are doing is so that Renán Barrera and Mauricio Vila Dosal, and those who have to do with this, take action on the matter“.
“It is not possible that the city council does not take care of its citizens, we are intimidated by the developers, they are suing us for doing what we are doing, for speaking out and saying things,” they said.
They are suing the citizens
On the other hand, they indicated that due to their protests, several neighbors have been sued by the real estate company for the alleged crime of defamation, which they consider as an act of harassment so that they desist from their struggle.
“The development sued the neighbors for 15 million pesos for defamation, there is a civil lawsuit,” they commented.
Rocio Viveros, neighbor of Altabrisa, who joined the mobilization and is one of the citizens who is fighting to protect a green area in the neighborhood, commented: “We have the same circumstances because they want to build a number of buildings and towers that really the space will not allow, in the long run they will cause us tremendous problems“.
She said that they are going to join the citizen struggles “because it cannot be that they continue to look us in the face and they really promised to have a good city and they have not respected it“.
At the end, she declared that “we want them to understand that they are going to create problems for us with a world of buildings, with a world of people, with what services? How is the area going to be maintained? Where are the services going to come from? From the ones we already have, it is not possible, they are going to make the services to be truncated. It is not acceptable that we are fighting for our families, our children and for our homes because they cost us, they were not given to us as a gift”.
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