Over the past few weeks, Ibiza’s most exclusive boats, luxury cars and even nightclubs and restaurants have become the target of protests by climate change and Marxist activists and the situation has caused widespread concern, according to the Bulletin’s sister paper El Periódico de Ibiza y Formentera.
The latest incidents in the port of Ibiza have caused many tycoons to reconsider their plans for this summer and they are opting not to go to the island with their yachts.
The situation has been triggered by the damage caused to the super yacht owned by Walmart heiress Nancy Walton’s yacht Kaos.
According to El Periódico de Ibiza y Formentera there have been changes in dates and cancellations of mooring reservations in the port of Ibiza after the attack on Nancy Walton’s luxury yacht Kaos.
Several of the port’s shipping agents contacted the port’s marina to enquire about the situation.
Although a message of calm has been conveyed, the fact remains that the events of last weekend have provoked huge concern.
“The acts of vandalism are damaging the island’s image in a comprehensive way,” said Juan Miguel Costa, director of Ibiza Tourism, who clearly points the finger at those responsible, the Futuro Vegetal activists, a splinter group of Extinction Rebellion, as the ones to blame for damaging the island’s reputation.
“At the end of the day, we are the passive sufferers because they are protesting about a very globalised issue here on the island,” he said.
“These types of people end up showing up here doing this kind of nonsense.” Juan Miguel Costa claims that they are trying to take advantage of the island’s important global image, whose fame is recognised all over the world.
According to Yacht Bible, an industry news site that says it tracks yacht purchases and ownership globally, Kaos belongs to Laurie, the granddaughter of Walmart cofounder Bud Walton. Laurie inherited a stake in Walmart from her father and received enough stock in the company when he died in 1995 to make her a billionaire, according to Forbes. She took the 268th spot on the magazine's billionaires list in 2023, and her net worth is valued at around $8.7 billion.
Grassroots climate activists, climate scientists and world leaders have for years been calling on the rich to reduce carbon emissions, as they point to the disproportionate greenhouse gas contributions from wealthy countries, like the United States, and individuals. In 2020, the United Nations urged the world's richest 1% to cut carbon footprints by around 97% in order to stave off ongoing climate change.
Its report that year warned that the global emissions gap, meaning the "difference between where we are likely to be and where we need to be" on climate policy, was dangerously large, and the wealthy were primarily responsible. At the time, the U.N. report said just 10% of the world's population emitted nearly half of the world's carbon pollution.