About 1,000 people took part on Sunday at a picnic at the holiday resort of Playa del Carmen, in protest at the arrest of a couple of tourists on the beach over the past week.
With ice shyllables, umbrellas, benches and horns, people gambled in front of the “Mamita’s Beach” club, a place frequented by international tourists on one of the main beaches of the place.
The protest was called up on social media after a video where police arrested two young men who remained on the arena, and who were beaten and pushed to a police station.
“My argument from the beginning to waiters was that the beach is public, they asked me to remove me because the beach club has a concession, minutes later the manager of the club after running sent us to the police, they arrested us, they handcuffed us and imprisoned,” Daniel said, after suffering the eviction of the police, according to Reforma.
Elements of the Solidarity Tourist #Policía beat and abused their authority to remove From the sand Mexican tourists who were sitting in the area of Playa Mamitas, as the club ensured that the area is their property. #PlayaDelCarmen pic.twitter.com/k9R9kuYwEP #Denuncia
— From Peninsula (@DesdePeninsula) February 17, 2020
“These beauties are also ours”
“I was born and raised here, i had also been run with my family from this beach,” Martha Enríquez, a 60-year-old woman in the neighboring town of Puerto Morelos, told AFP on Sunday.
“Today we come to tell you that these beauties are also ours, our children and our grandchildren,” he added.
With banners and a Mexican flag, a group of people shouted that the beaches are also for the locals and that you cannot condition the stay in them.
The protest was also joined by foreigners from different nationalities, who live in Playa del Carmen or who learned about the event on social media.
After the assault on the bathers, the beach club offered public apologies and attributed the conflict to the couple refusing to retreat from a service corridor. The company later said that no illegal action was taken as they have a concession on site.
CLUB MAMITAS broadcasts a video today about the #PicNicMamitas @MamitasBeach #PicNicMasivo pic.twitter.com/LVxm5XocSF
— ReportLobby Tourism (@ReporteLobby) February 23, 2020
Mexican laws stipulate that access to beaches may not be inhibited or restricted except when working on the care and conservation of the beaches.
Playa del Carmen is one of the main tourist spots in the Mexican Caribbean, along with Cancun, and is a place frequented by domestic and foreign tourists.
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