INAH to reopen Toniná after wresting site from landowner who demanded government pay rent

Nearly 3 years aft it was abruptly closed to the public, the Toniná archaeological portion successful confederate Chiapas has been reclaimed by the national government.

The nationalist practice tract was shuttered successful 2023 aft a backstage landholder of a 9.22-hectare parcel wrong the analyzable allegedly refused to let visitors unless the authorities agreed to wage monthly rent.

In Toniná, Chiapas, a pre-Columbian crypt hints astatine cremation rites carried retired by authorities officials.
(Cuartoscuro)

On Dec. 18, 2025, President Sheinbaum issued a decree to expropriate the privately owned area. Authorities from the National Institute of Anthropology and History (INAH) connected Tuesday took possession of the site, which volition present beryllium dedicated to conservation and research.

Toniná was declared an archaeological portion successful 1994 and is considered to beryllium 1 of the astir important sites successful the Maya region. It comprises an acropolis built upon a 70-meter-high pyramidal base, with 7 platforms supporting temples, palaces and ritual sites, connected by 260 staircases. 

“Toniná is an indispensable portion of the surviving past of Chiapas and Mexico,” Culture Minister Claudia Curiel de Icaza said. “This decree [to reclaim the land] is simply a measurement that protects a nationalist plus and contributes to exercising taste rights done entree to cognition and humanities memory.” 

Curiel besides said that Toniná’s betterment demonstrates Mexico’s capableness to sphere archaeological heritage, guarantee its management, and enactment conservation, restoration and probe efforts.

Speaking astatine the tract during an lawsuit celebrating the expropriation, Chiapas Governor Eduardo Ramírez Aguilar said helium expects the determination to beforehand liable tourism, which volition enactment economical maturation successful the valley. “This measurement fulfills President Claudia Sheinbaum’s committedness to reopen the doors of this taste and humanities abstraction that belongs to Chiapas, to Mexico, and to the world,” Ramírez Aguilar said.

The Sheinbaum medication plans to enactment successful coordination with section communities to instrumentality socially liable tourism projects based connected the doctrine of “buen vivir” (good living), according to Ramírez Aguilar. 

Toniná is acceptable to reopen to the nationalist connected March 21.

With reports from Excelsior and La Jornada