Bad Bunny, pictured acting on stage in Philadelphia in September, completed his worldwide tour in Mexico City final weekend — however many followers had been denied entry after being informed their tickets had been illegitimate.

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Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Roc Nation

Bad Bunny, pictured acting on stage in Philadelphia in September, completed his worldwide tour in Mexico City final weekend — however many followers had been denied entry after being informed their tickets had been illegitimate.

Theo Wargo/Getty Images for Roc Nation

Mexico’s president is hoping Bad Bunny can save the day after one other Ticketmaster snafu shut lots of of ticket-holding followers out of his live shows final weekend.

Andrés Manuel López Obrador is asking on the Puerto Rican reggaeton star to carry out totally free in Mexico City’s Zócalo sq., saying in his daily briefing Wednesday that the federal government may pay for the lights, stage and sound system — and even set up a zipper line within the central plaza.

López Obrador acknowledged that Bad Bunny — who simply closed his worldwide tour in Mexico and plans to take a break in 2023 — is “overworked and tired,” however urged he would possibly think about the request as a result of he’s a “supportive” and “sensitive” particular person, in keeping with the Guardian.

“It made us very emotional to see sad young people who couldn’t enter because their tickets were cloned, because they were cheated, some crying,” the president added. “They saved for a long time to be able to buy their tickets.”

Bad Bunny has not commented publicly on the ticket debacle or the president’s request. NPR has reached out to the singer’s staff for remark.

Some 80,000 followers attended the final two exhibits of his “World’s Hottest Tour” in Mexico City’s Estadio Azteca — the largest stadium in Latin America — final Friday and Saturday. But lots of of others had been denied entry to the venue after being informed the tickets they’d bought by means of Ticketmaster weren’t legitimate.

A complete of 1,600 defective tickets had been reported on the primary evening, and 110 on the second, in keeping with Profeco, Mexico’s shopper watchdog company.

Estadio Azteca said on Friday that it had canceled some followers’ entry for security causes after Ticketmaster Mexico “detected cases of duplication and/or falsification of tickets,” NBC News reported.

Mexican regulators allege the problem is because of Ticketmaster overselling tickets and is looking for to carry the corporate accountable by means of fines and refunds.

Profeco head Ricardo Sheffield informed native media over the weekend that an investigation discovered that many tickets dubbed false had truly been bought by means of respectable channels.

“Ticketmaster claimed they were counterfeit, but they were all issued by them,” he stated, according to Billboard.

Sheffield stated that Ticketmaster Mexico owes all affected followers a full refund plus a 20% compensation payment. It may very well be fined as a lot as 10% of its whole gross sales in 2021.

“As we are a fiscal authority, if they don’t want to pay of their own will, we will seize their accounts then, and they will pay because they have to,” Sheffield added.

Ticketmaster Mexico denied claims of overcrowding or overselling in a statement posted in Spanish on Twitter, during which it stated that greater than 4.5 million individuals had registered for 120,000 whole tickets.

“On Friday, an unprecedented number of false tickets, not bought through our official channels, were presented at the gates,” the corporate stated, in keeping with an AP translation, including that entrances induced “temporary interruptions in the ticket reading system, which unfortunately momentarily impeded recognition of legitimate tickets.”

The firm additionally apologized to affected ticket holders and has agreed to pay them the refund and compensation payment, NBC News stories. Meanwhile, Sheffield says his workplace has gotten sufficient shopper complaints that it’s gearing as much as file a class-action lawsuit.

That can be the second such lawsuit towards the ticketing big: Taylor Swift followers filed go well with earlier this month accusing Ticketmaster and its father or mother firm of fraud and antitrust violations after its botched Eras Tour ticket sales.

The U.S. Justice Department had reportedly opened an antitrust investigation into the corporate even earlier than the Swift snafu, which in flip prompted many Democratic lawmakers to name for regulation and several other state attorneys normal to launch shopper safety probes.