Following a string of recent incidents, the Mexican tourist hotspot Cancun, Quintana Roo is cracking down on taxi drivers who assault travelers for using rideshare apps.
Three taxi drivers were arrested for threatening a traveler trying to use a rideshare app earlier this month in Puerto Morelos, a seaside resort town halfway between Cancun and Playa del Carmen, according to a Dec. 11 news release by the State Attorney General’s Office of Quintana Roo.
The drivers were identified from a social media video in which “they intimidate a tourist, to force him to cancel a transportation service on the digital platform,” the release said.
In the video, the drivers block the English-speaking tourist from getting into the rideshare vehicle, according to The Associated Press. “It’s not possible … you can’t take Uber because we’re going to call the police, we’re going to block him, and you’re going to be in trouble, too,” they reportedly said in the video.
The Mobility Institute of the State of Quintana Roo has canceled the concessions for the three suspects and is now investigating their driving licenses.
Taxi drivers hold a protest against the regulation of taxi-hailing apps such as Uber in Cancun, Mexico January 11, 2023.
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Raciel López Salazar, head of the State Attorney General’s Office, calls on its taxi drivers to “respect public space and carry out this work in an orderly manner.”
Salazar added that “all acts that put the integrity of local users and national and international visitors at risk will not be permitted, nor will it be concealed, and much less tolerated in Quintana Roo.”
In November, two other taxi drivers were arrested for a similar assault on another motorist who they thought worked for a rideshare service in front of an ecotourism park in Solidaridad, another popular tourist area, according to a Monday news release by the State Attorney’s General Office.
A group of drivers “surrounded the private vehicle, threatened the driver, and forced the tourists to get out of the vehicle they were in and get into a taxi.”
An investigation into these two drivers resulted in arrests linked to drug dealing as well.
Uber had been banned in Mexico until 2023 – to the upset of local taxi unions. Since then, there have been videos of tourists being attacked and harassed by taxi drivers if they attempt to use the rideshare service.
“Taxistas is a very powerful organization in Mexico, and they are not afraid to protest and/or intimidate to keep their monopoly,” Jeff Lanno, founder of Hola Weddings, a travel agency based on the Riviera Maya, had told USA TODAY following the legalization of Uber in Mexico in Jan. 2023.
“Quintana Roo is, in general, a safe place to visit and get around as a local and as a tourist,” Hola Weddings community manager Ricardo Cruz, who is originally from the south of Mexico City and now lives in Playa del Carmen, said. “I have traveled to major cities in the U.S., Europe, and Asia, and I feel much safer here than in some parts of New York or Istanbul. I think common sense and basic precautions apply everywhere you travel.”
Source: The Associated Press
