A Yucatecan senator in the Mexican Congress wants the federal government to take the rest of Chichen Itza, that is all the property that was not purchased in March by the government of the state of Yucatan.

Senator Hugo Laviada Molina, a member of the PAN party, proposed earlier this month that INAH, the federal agency that oversees the ruins of Mexico, take by expropriation some 500 hectares owned by members of the Barbachano family.

This property includes the Mayaland Hotel, which the family built and has operated for 80 years, as well as the buildings of the Hacienda Chichen, which the family converted into a top class resort and spa. The family also owns the property upon which rests Chichen Viejo, a network of ruins that are not open to the public. The ruins of Chichen Viejo are owned by the people Mexico and in the care of INAH.

The PAN senator said he wants to take the property of the Barbachanos using “legal appraisal, accountability, respect for the law and proper handling of national resources,” stating this was not done with the sale of the archaeological zone to the PRI-party controlled State of Yucatan. Members of the PAN party, which recently lost several elections in Yucatan, have been openly critical of the Chichen sale. Senator Laviada Molina also called for Yucatan Governor Ivonne Ortega Pacheco (PRI) to make public the conditions, terms and amounts of the Chichen purchase, as well as the source of the money used.

The state agreed to pay the owner of the 83-hectare archaeological zone, Hans Jurgen Thies Barbachano, $220 million Mexician ($17.6 million US). This was after the federal government failed in its attempt to expropriate the property. The federal government’s official appraisal of all of Chichen Itza and surrounding lands owned by the Barbachano family and others, approximately 1,500 hectares (3,750 acres) was only $8 million Mexican (at the time approximately $500,000 US), which to slightly more than $100 US per acre.

For more information regarding Senator Laviada Molina’s statement, see the Diario de Yucatan article HERE.