Claudia Sheinbaum’s government’s new peace plan to resolve the insecurity crisis in Michoacán continues to progress. Authorities have arrested at least 122 people in the territory in the past two weeks, the Federal Secretary of Security said in a statement on Tuesday. It is the reaction of the Executive to the traumatic murder of the former mayor of Uruapan Carlos Manzo in early November, which revealed the extent of the violence that Michoacán is experiencing.
On November 10, the fourth territorial pacification plan in 19 years began in Michoacán. Sheinbaum’s bet was to try to put out the fire in the state, supported by his Secretary of Security, Omar García Harfuch, who defined peace in Michoacán “a national priority”. In the last two weeks – from the 10th to the 24th – the authorities have also seized 56 weapons, 66 explosives and over 7,000 ammunition. And they seized almost 450 kilos of different drugs, to which chemical boosters are added to manufacture them, around 9,200 liters and 2,300 kilos of substances to produce synthetic drugs.
These are the data provided by the Secretariat of Omar García Harfuch, who in recent weeks has carried out several arrests throughout the territory of Michoacan. Last Tuesday, the agency carried out a new operation in which it captured four more people, accompanied by other state and federal security forces, such as the National Guard, the Secretary of the Navy or the Attorney General of the Republic and State. “With the aim of giving security and confidence to residents, patrols were carried out in the municipalities of Uruapan, Chinicuila, Copándaro, Morelia, Parácuaro, Nuevo San Juan Parangaricutiro and Villa Madero,” reads the letter from the agency.
Despite the authorities’ efforts, violence has not completely stopped in Michoacán. On November 12, Carlos Manzo’s widow and successor, Grecia Itzel Quiroz, announced the cancellation of the November 20 parade in Uruapan due to insecurity. The next day, the municipal manager expressed to García Harfuch the citizens’ weariness with insecurity, despite the implementation of the federal pacification plan in Michoacán. “The feeling of citizens is fed up. There is social tiredness, social distrust (…) There is no more hope in the (federal) government”, he then stated.
In the presentation of this new plan, Sheinbaum signaled a public-private investment of approximately 57 billion pesos, approximately 3 billion dollars, although approximately 26 billion would be allocated to road infrastructure. The president also decided to announce that over the next year he will allocate 37 billion pesos, approximately 2 billion dollars, in social programs that will benefit 1.5 million inhabitants of a state of five million.
The Uruapan data reveal the insecurity that the territory experiences. 82.6% of its inhabitants believe that the municipality is not safe in the third quarter of the year, according to data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (Inegi), which places it as the fifth territory with this perception at a national level. The figure does not constitute a total exception for the State, which in 2024 ended the year with a rate of 16,572 crime victims per 100,000 inhabitants, an increase of 10.5 percentage points compared to the previous year, when this rate was 14,993 victims per 100,000 inhabitants.
