Cananea (municipality)

Cananea is both a municipality in the northwestern Mexican state of Sonora and the municipal seat. For information about the town see Cananea.

Population

The population of the municipality of Cananea was 32,061 (2000 census). Most of the population lives in the municipal seat, which had 30,515 inhabitants in the same year.

*Population in 1980: 25,327
*Population in 1990: 26,931
*Population in 2000: 32,061.

History

The territory now occupied by the municipality was originally a rancheria inhabited by the Pima Indians, who had been pacified by the Spanish in the seventeenth century.

According to local information, the word Cananea comes from two Apache words: “can” which means "meat" and “efa” which means "horse".

The colonial development of Cananea was influenced gby the nearby missions of Arizpe, Santa María and Cocóspera. In the middle of the nineteenth century Cananea became part of the province of Sonora, becoming a "real de minas". On 8 November 1901, Cananea was raised to municipal status, after having been part of the municipality of Fronteras.

In 1906 the site was stage to perhaps the most famous strike in Mexican history, the "huelga de Cananea". This strike was against the American owned mining company and was put down by forces brought across the border from the United States with considerable loss of life on the part of the striking miners. This strike is considered to be one of the precursors to the Mexican Revolution of 1910.

Cananea became a municipality in 1901. In 1937 the territory of Naco separated and it became Naco (municipality). On October 31, 2001, the city of Cananea temporarily became the capital of the state of Sonora during the celebrations of the 100th anniversary of the municipality.

Geography

This "municipio" borders Cochise County, Arizona in the United States (north) and the municipalities of Arizpe (south), Naco and Bacoachi (east) and Ímuris and Santa Cruz (west). Its total area is 4,414.1 square kilometers and its average elevation is 1,500 meters above sea level.

In addition to the municipal seat there are several small communities: ejido Morelos, Emiliano Zapata, Zaragoza and Vicente.

Cananea has a relatively high altitude. The most important mountain peaks are Manzanal, Los Ajos, Canane, Magallanes, Azul and la Mariquita (2,480 m), which has an observatory of the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM). See [http://www.inaoep.mx/~astrofi/cananea/] .

The most important rivers are: Sonora, Bacanuchi and San Pedro; other streams are: Jaralito, Río Claro, Santa Bárbara, Los Difuntos, El Sauz, El Berrendo, El Álamo, Villa Verde, El Chiflón, Cuitaca, Cocóspera, El Anillo and San Antonio.

There were 34 wells (2000), of which 20 were for irrigation, 11 for water supply for the Compañía minera de Cananea, and 4 for drinking water for Cananea and ejido Zaragoza.

The climate is semihot subhumid with an average monthly maximum temperature of 23.5°C in the months of June to Semptember and an average monthly minimum temperature of 7.4°C in December and January; the average annual temperature is 15.3°C.

The vegetation is pasture in almost all of the area, while there are still stands of oak pine in the higher elevations. The areas that can be irrigated are scarce.

Economic activity

Mining is still very important with copper mines in the municipal seat. Cattle raising is also widely practiced. The main agricultural products are corn, beans, barley, sorghum, alfalfa, and apples.

In the municipal seat there are manufacturing companies that operate under the system called maquila, assembling products for re-export to the United States.

Government

The current municipal president of Cananea is Luis Carlos Cha Flores, a member of the National Action Party and his term expires in 2009. He was previously secretary of the municipality during the 2003–2006 term.Thanks to the corruption and inefficiency of the current and past four municipal administrations, Cananea's most important industry is drug and people trafficking. In the past six years alone, the town was invaded by drug dealers and coyotes as Cananea is strategically located in the U.S. border with Arizona. These criminals were provided with immunity and protection by Mayor Francisco Garcia Gamez, his puppet succesor Mayor Luis Carlos Cha and his now deceased corrupt police chief, Police Chief Ramon Tacho Verdugo who was assassinated early in 2007 allegedly for his connections with organized crime. This of course spawned a wave of crimes and murders across the region, which were often overlooked by the municipal authorities. Francisco Garcia used the local media to disguise the criminal activities that were taking place here. Even to this day, one of the weekly newspapers that are published, Revista Semanal Proyeccion, worships the actions of Garcia and Luis Carlos Cha. This "newspaper" made and continues to make very significant profits from municipal administrators in exchange for good publicity.

ources

* [http://www.sonora.gob.mx/portal/Runscript.asp?p=ASPpg188.asp Government of Cananea]
* [http://www.e-local.gob.mx/wb2/ELOCAL/EMM_sonora Enciclopedia de los Municipios de México]