Detainees were released in exchange for accepting the City Hall umbrellas, said merchants.
Merchants during the demonstration on the access to Chapala on the Guadalajara – Chapala highway. Photo: Jazmín Stengel.
Jazmín Stengel(Chapala).- Despite demonstrations and blockades by a group of boardwalk merchants in the main access to the municipality of Chapala, the City Council removed the existing tarps covering outdoor merchants and imposed the use of umbrellas in the restaurant zone. The events took place during the first day of Holy Week, on April 14. Two protest leaders were arrested.
The double demonstration closed the access to the municipality by the Guadalajara – Chapala highway for more than an hour. The main intersection at Francisco I. Madero and Hidalgo avenues was obstructed for almost two-and-one-half hours. While the point at the entrance to the Ajijic beltway was only blocked for a few minutes.
The more than 50 protesters were invited to form a committee of five representatives to talk with authorities. Saying, “We are willing to work, but not in your way,” they asked for a personal meeting with Chapala Municipal President, Alejandro de Jesús Aguirre Curiel, who never showed up.
During the meeting of the protesters with municipal authorities, state and municipal authorities detained two of the merchants for “inciting the demonstrators” and “obstructing the freedom of transit,” according to Commissioner Sergio Conzuelo Ramírez.
The merchants’ main complaint is the requirement to buy umbrellas at a high cost. The Municipal Council intended the umbrellas to improve the boardwalk’s image.
A press release issued by Social Communication on April 14 read, “We hereby notify you that in order to provide better service and a better image to tourists and visitors to Chapala, especially to the boardwalk area, as of April 13 of this year, the use of tarpaulins, banners or awnings in the areas of food and beverage sales is prohibited.”
The only objects authorized by the Municipality to shade the area are “metal umbrellas painted in brown, with a cement casting base and a high-density green canvas with the logo of the Municipality of Chapala printed on it, which have a value of 4,000 pesos.”
Social Communication claimed, however, that “the total cost is 5,600 pesos per umbrella, of which 2,800, or 50 percent, must be paid by each tenant and the other 50 percent by the Municipality.”
Semanario Laguna compared the cost in another local store and the costs vary from 1,500 to 1,800 pesos per unit, with a canvas and a diameter of two meters. Meanwhile, larger umbrellas of three meters in diameter cost up to two thousand pesos in canvas, although of lower quality and lacking the basic joints to position the umbrella.
The umbrella requirements were imposed on the merchants without the option of looking for another supplier, said the merchants after two months of dialogue with the authorities. The merchants also proposed to install a dome financed by the interested vendors, but never received authorization.
Translated by Mike Rogers
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