The imposition of the “Ruta de las Culturas Mayas” highway, which aims to connect the Chiapas cities of Palenque and San Cristóbal de las Casas, is moving forward through threats and strategies to fragment communities; manipulation of local authorities and conditions placed on access to social programs; as well as irregularities in environmental impact studies.
These allegations were raised by indigenous and human rights organizations during the discussion forum “Yes to Life, No to the Dispossession of Territory!,” held last Saturday, February 28, following a documentation caravan through affected communities in northern Chiapas, where construction is currently underway.
Among the participants were members of the Movement in Defense of Life and Territory (Modevite), the Fray Bartolomé de las Casas Human Rights Center (CDH Frayba), Economic and Social Development of Indigenous Mexicans (DESMI), and the Center for Mexican and Central American Studies (Cemca), who during the discussion presented findings indicating that construction is proceeding in these territories without complying with procedures such as conducting a free, prior, and informed consultation, nor presenting a serious study on the environmental and social impacts of the highway.
“What we see in terms of the impacts of this megaproject is ethnocide, ecocide, and, if criminalization occurs, it could amount to genocide,” declared a young member of Modevite during the event held in the city of San Cristóbal de las Casas.
For her part, Pascuala Vázquez, from the same organization, asserted that the project previously known as the “Highway of Cultures” is an extractivist project “engineered by the highest powers. The state and corporations are the only beneficiaries. We, the poor, grow poorer, and the rich grow richer.”
Strategies of Attrition and Community Division
According to the Frayba Human Rights Center, indigenous communities in northern Chiapas are experiencing a “policy of attrition” that combines threats and coercive measures against residents and community leaders. They also documented complaints regarding the presence of security forces, including police officers and the National Guard, who are creating tension and intimidation. “All this time, it has been a Machiavellian strategy,” the human rights center asserts.
Meanwhile, members of Desmi emphasized the communities’ complaints about engineers entering their territories, who are conducting measurements for road construction without authorization. In response to the residents’ resistance, the organization reports that the technicians have threatened to bring in members of the Pakal Immediate Reaction Force (FRIP), an elite police unit whose members are popularly known as “pakales,” in order to continue their work despite public opposition.
According to the Frayba Human Rights Center, these practices constitute structural violence against indigenous communities, which were not identified in the documentation due to fear of threats and harassment. “They feel revictimized and do not want to speak out. There is a terrible fragmentation of the community fabric, where assemblies no longer serve as the highest authority,” the center notes regarding how decisions are made in negotiations involving only ejido agents or commissioners.
In some cases, they reported, residents were asked to sign blank sheets of paper that were later used as authorization for the highway’s construction. In one community, after realizing their authorities had been manipulated, residents forced the community representative to sign a document rejecting the highway project.
The organizations also documented the use of social programs such as Sembrando Vida as leverage to secure approval for the highway. Desmi explained that in the communities where highway construction is already underway, in the municipality of Palenque, the authorities have conditioned payment for the ejido members’ land on their acceptance of the funds provided under the reforestation program.
As a result, organizations are warning of serious fractures in the community fabric. “If the family unit is breaking down, imagine what happens to an entire community,” warned the Frayba Human Rights Center. “We wonder why there is no longer any resistance. Of course there is, but it comes at a price—sometimes even with one’s life,” stated the human rights center regarding the consequences of strategies aimed at stifling resistance to the megaproject.
Projects without Environmental Studies or Public Consultation
Regarding environmental impacts, Desmi reported that work on the first section of the highway project—from Palenque to the municipality of Chilón—began in June 2025, four months before the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) was even approved, which did not occur until October of that same year.
In addition, the EIS was presented in a fragmented manner, making it impossible to seriously assess the cumulative impacts of the highway route. A researcher from CEMCA described the environmental study as “superficial” due to the lack of data on impacts to ecosystems, water bodies, flora, and fauna—including endangered species such as the Chiapas catfish and the Lacandon shrew—which could be negatively affected by the construction.
“It’s more of a formality than a serious study. It’s about getting the green light to move forward with the construction, rather than genuinely addressing the actual environmental impact,” the researcher stated. The route, up to 80 meters wide, will involve cutting through mountains in mesophilic forest ecosystems, as well as excavations, landfills, and alterations to natural drainage.
Consequently, the organizations warn of risks of landslides, floods, local droughts, as well as contamination of springs by runoff of chemicals derived from asphalt. In several cases, the highway passes near or over water sources. “In some communities, we’re talking about dozens of affected springs,” they warned.
The communities and organizations maintain that construction began without a free, prior, and informed consultation having taken place. According to the Frayba Human Rights Commission, the government limited itself to meeting with oversight councils or key stakeholders, excluding the ejido assemblies. For its part, Modevite noted that people with political or business interests were bussed in, and that videos in indigenous languages were circulated claiming—contrary to the communities’ position—that the project has the approval of indigenous populations.
As a result of this situation, they filed two constitutional appeals in 2025. The first was against the guidelines for the impromptu “show of hands” vote organized by Governor Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar during a political rally held in February 2025. The second appeal was filed over the lack of information and the violation of the right to self-determination. However, they have not yet received a response regarding these legal proceedings.
Behind the Tourism: Territorial Reorganization
According to the organizations’ analysis, behind the official rhetoric that positions tourism as the driving force behind the highway project lies a large-scale territorial reorganization. For the CDH Frayba, the same strategies of imposition are being used to implement megaprojects in southeastern Mexico, such as the Maya Train and the Interoceanic Corridor of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. “It’s all of Chiapas and the entire route of the Puebla-Panama Plan,” the center noted.
For the members of Desmi, the Highway of the Cultures is a long-standing proposal that “had stalled, but now they have found ways to implement it through a strategy developed over several years. The highway is intended to be a continuation of the Maya Train and the Interoceanic Corridor (…) Here, it is not the needs of the communities are not being considered, but those of global commerce,” the organization stated.
The project, first announced in 2009 and stalled by community resistance, was revived by the Chiapas State Legislature in 2019 when it approved its expansion to the municipality of Pijijiapan, on the Chiapas coast, and included a branch line to the municipality of Ocosingo. Opposition from Tzotzil and Tzeltal communities has been documented for over a decade, as has the criminalization of land defenders, which has even been highlighted by international bodies for its link to the imposition of megaprojects.
For these organizations, the rejection of the construction of the “Highway of Cultures” stems from the fact that it is not merely an infrastructure project, but rather part of a territorial reconfiguration linked to regional megaprojects that threatens to radically transform their way of life.
Original text by Aldo Santiago published by Avispa Midia on March 3rd, 2026.
Translation by Schools for Chiapas.