A competitor of Mars,Hershey's, supported the gene mapping of the Criollo, a far less common cacao tree.
VOA: special.2010.10.19
He meant that the Memorial Plaza is so weighted with meaning, and emotions run so deep, that something as common as a dying tree could take on symbolic significance.
If you want to understand what is happening there, imagine: Under the Liberty Tree that stood in Boston Common, early in the first American Revolution, any and all could come to air their grievances and hammer out solutions collectively, and it was there the promise of American democracy first took root.