US company rejects criticism, takeover offer from Mexico, says president’s plans harm environment
MEXICO CITY (AP) — A U.S. quarrying company on Monday rejected the Mexican president’s campaign of criticism and shutdowns, as well as his offer to buy its property on the Caribbean coast.
In July, President Andrés Manuel López Obrador offered to buy the U.S. company’s property on the Caribbean coast for about $385 million, amid a bitter, years-long conflict.
Alabama-based Vulcan Materials said in a statement Monday that the offer “significantly undervalues our assets.”
In documents filed in the case before an international arbitration panel, Vulcan Materials valued the nearly 6,000-acre (2,400-hectare) property, located just south of the resort town of Playa del Carmen, at 1. 9 billion dollars.
Mexico’s president has previously threatened to expropriate the vast property, saying the pits he dug to extract crushed limestone had damaged the region’s fragile system of underground rivers and caves.
But Vulcan Materials rejected this accusation. “Our operations have not negatively affected underground caves, cenotes or archaeological sites. In fact, we have mapped, protected and preserved these valuable resources,” the company said in a statement.
Instead, the company alleged that other quarries in the area were being mined illegally. “Unlike other operating sites that operated illegally to supply the Mayan train, our operations were duly authorized,” the company said.
The Mayan Train is a pet project of López Obrador to build a tourist train around the Yucatan Peninsula. Activists, cave divers and archaeologists say the project has damaged the caves, which are home to some of the oldest human remains in North America.
The president’s office had no immediate reaction to Vulcan’s allegations.
López Obrador has said in the past that the most attractive part of the property is the company’s cargo dock — the only deep port on the mainland coast — which he plans to turn into a dock for cruise ships . He says he wants to turn the rest of the property into a nature reserve.
“The Mexican government is using these political threats and false allegations to try to justify converting our property into a ‘naturally protected area,’ which could – ironically – be used not to protect the environment but for conservation purposes. commercial tourism and naval operations, including cruises. maritime activity,” the company said.
López Obrador said he also wants to use the flooded pits the company has dug in hundreds of hectares of limestone soil as “swimming pools” or as an “ecotourism” area that would be operated under concession by a private operator.
The huge pits are inhabited by crocodiles, a protected species in Mexico.
The company’s dock in Punta Venado is the only one in the region capable of handling cement, crushed stone and other shipments for the Maya Train. The 1,500-kilometer-long Maya Train Line is intended to run a rough loop around the Yucatan Peninsula, connecting resorts and archaeological sites.
López Obrador presents the train as a way to bring some of Cancun’s tourism revenue to inland communities that have not shared in that wealth. But there is no credible feasibility study showing that tourists would want to use the train.
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