Wal-Mart’s incursion into the Teotichuacan, Mexico historic pyramid site has raised the ire of local residents, but now they have begun an effort to locate another store near a famous volcano. Here’s a report from the town of Amecameca: “A Wal-Mart store is planned for a beautiful centuries-old plaza in the volcanoes region. Destruction of an historic monument has now resumed after being halted temporarily by federal historic monuments agency. The land use permit was issued in violation of state laws, which hopefully will soon be questioned by local municipal council. Young people and local merchants have taken an important role in raising consciousness of the price which they would have to pay. This region is only 15 miles from the crater of the now-active Popocatepetl volcano, and is the major remaining aquifer recharge area for Mexico City. Amecameca is about an hour and a half from Teotihuacan. There is some contact between members of both movements, and we understand that there will soon be a regional (central Mexico) meeting among a number of towns facing the Wal-Mart invasion. Our historic granary has already been partly demolished, in a process which has been temporarily halted by the state office of the National Institute for Historical Monuments. This region is a critical ecological region, and our university project has elaborated all the urban and eoclogical planning tools for this zone, all of which prohibit this kind of construction. The zoning and building permits they have are not legal, since they were decided at the state government level, not on the municipal level as the law specifies. There is surely a lot of money rolling around. We face an arrogant, culturally offensive and illegal behavior.”
For local contacts in Amecameca fighting Wal-Mart, contact [email protected]. For similar stories, search Newsflash by “Mexico.” Cuernavaca, Teotihuacan, and Amecameca have all organized to fight off the economic colonialism represented by Wal-Mart Stores, Inc.
