The Comaac Indians no longer want the Sea of Cortez to be called that way. They thus join a series of proposals in the Mexican Congress that seek to generate territoriality to the waters that enclose the states of Baja California Sur and Norte, Sonora and Sinaloa.
Incidentally, they would remove means the symbol of the beginning of its own historical tragedy that represented the landing of the conqueror Hernán Cortés in 1535 .
“They are determined,” lawyer Clara Ivette Avila, spokeswoman for the Comaac Nation, popularly known as seris, told this newspaper, a name she gave them “despotically” (according to her feelings) after the arrival of the Spanish. “They will shortly present a judicial proposal to eliminate Cortés’s name.”
Instead, The Comacc have a proposed name: Puerta del Anahuac. This idea for the new name is not definitive. They continue to analyze it along with other alternatives as controversial as the change they suggest.
The issue is not new. Last September, Deputy Hirepan Maya proposed to change the name of the Sea of Cortez to “Mar del Yaqui” as a way to claim the 500 years of “indigenous resistance”, a policy pushed by the administration of President Andrés Manuel López Obrador.
In 2021, Mexico complied 200 years of independence from Spain and 500 of the fall of Tenochtitlán, the main Mexica city, a fact that It is considered that it was the start of the colonial era in the country.
In this context, the name of the plaza in Mexico City was changed, where the ahuehuete tree is located next to the that the conqueror Hernán Cortés shed his tears in the so-called Sad Night after losing a battle on 30 July 1520. Now it is called “Victorious Night Square”.
That same year, el 19 in August, Puente de Alvarado avenue also changed its name to the Mexico-Tenochtitlan road and the Metrobus Line 4 station was also renamed, which had the name of the Spanish conqueror.
With this background, the Lawyer Avila says that the comaac calculate now is the time to look at their sea and take up the initiative of deputy Maya and some others who have been sent to the legislative freeze without giving them a ball.
“Changing the name would help various causes, such as putting the focus on a very impoverished and create territoriality to ensure that these waters are considered national and the United States ceases to have the right of way that it achieved with the invasion of Mexico since mid-1,800”, he warns.
The context
In 2019, Senator Lucía Trasviña returned to the fray for the fourth time in the history of the legislature in a battle to ensure that the Sea of Cortez becomes part of Mexico and prevent other countries from having interference in what happens there because today it is considered international waters.
“We have not been able to recognize or claim his property”, he argued. “Since the time of former President Luis Echeverría (1970-1970) they wanted to do it, but the United States opposed it”.
EE.UU. has the right of passage to the Sea of Cortez since the signing of the Mesilla Treaty with Antonio López de Santa Ana. Subsequently, Benito Juárez allowed the installation of a US military base to load coal and it continued like this until 1911.
Then the US Army left, but followed suit open to the government of the country to date.
“The native peoples of the region they want to put an end to that with the name change and as an autonomous indigenous nation (endorsed by the agreement 169 of the International Labor Organization) can add arguments”, observed Alvaro Visuet, legislative commissioner of the National Council of Native Peoples and Afro-descendants.
“The mistake made by the legislators who previously proposed it is that they did it without social support from the original communities.”
Past and present
The autonomous territory of the Comaac it was granted by decree last century by the then president Luis Echeverría. It has an extension of almost 100,000 hectares; of which, 107 kilometers are part of the coast of the Sea of Cortez: from Punta Chueca to Punta de San Nicolás, Sonora.
The ethnic group was never subdued by the Spanish, like others in the rest of the country, but rather remained isolated with their respective social marginalization: they have problems with water supply, drainage, electricity and closures for fishing, its main economic activity.
The creation of a comcaac municipality is part of its basic agenda. Isla Tiburón, El Desemboque and Punta Chueca, which belong to different municipalities, would form part of it. With this they would obtain independent resources that the authorities of Hermosillo and Pitiquito now manage to their liking.
The renaming of the Sea of Cortez would help its causes, they say. But they don’t have it easy. The indigenous claim has sharp detractors who consider that the mestizo history, which also has Spanish roots, cannot be erased in one go.
The former governor of Baja California responded with a sharp criticism when the legislator Maya proposed the name change to Mar Yaqui. He recalled that it is not the only ethnic group that inhabits the area and that thanks to the landing of Cortés in what is now La Paz, several cultures merged into a single territory.
“Is it in serious?” he questioned. “Sea of Cortez is not even the official name.”
The International Hydrographic Organization gives it the name of Gulf of California to determine the international character of those waters of the line that is created between Punta Piaxtla in Sinaloa and the southern tip of Baja California.
“I do not agree with removing the name of the Sea of Cortez”, said Julio Rivera, a doctor from Mexico City. “It would be absurd: the Metro Villa de Cortés or the Hacienda de Cortés Restaurant would also have to disappear and we are also children of that race (Spanish) as well as of multiple ethnic groups in the country.”
From the argument of the vindication, it is seen with the eyes of historical justice and a balance in the historical imaginary: Hispanic people imposed their culture by far. The names are part of it.
The change proposed by the Comaac for the Sea of Cortez has two battles: one legal and one legislative. In the latter, lobbying is done to be able to take it to plenary shortly.
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