In February 1996, the magazine Africamerica, published by my Venezuela-based Fundación Afroamerica Y Diaspora Africana, ran a front-page story that declared “Migrations: problems of the third millennium.”
Our 1995 analysis looked at the fact that Venezuela, after World Wars I and II, became a receiving center for European migrants. While they welcomed migrants as a gesture of solidarity, Venezuelan governments of the day also promoted bringing in Europeans as a way of helping “improve the race” (“mejorar la raza”), according to former Venezuelan Minister of Economy Alberto Adriani, who helped facilitate European migration. Venezuela was traditionally a country mostly comprising Blacks and Indigenous people.
Later, when dictatorships took over in Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and Uruguay, Venezuela received tens of thousands of migrants from those nations as they fled despotic governments. And because of the armed conflicts that lasted for almost half a century in Colombia, Venezuela received nearly 5 million Colombian immigrants.
Venezuelan migrations
With the election of President Hugo Chávez in 1998 and the rise in oil prices, Venezuela once again became a nation that attracted thousands of migrants. It saw a large number of migrants from 2002 (after the attempted coup against Chávez) until the March 9, 2015, declaration by then-President Barack Obama that Venezuela was an “unusual and extraordinary threat” to the United States.
When Donald Trump came to power, his administration initiated some 900 coercive and unilateral measures against Venezuela. His actions led to an inhumane blockade that prohibited medicine and food, and seized Venezuelan state funds in international banks, among other perverse effects. These coercive measures have led many Venezuelan men and women, regardless of their views on the Venezuelan government, to make the decision to migrate. Most are just looking to survive: They are searching for better conditions and opportunities for wages, salaries, health, and food to satisfy their general needs.
The migration of millions of Venezuelans became a business for non-governmental organizations (NGOs), United Nations agencies, and the Organization of American States, who became the intermediaries for funds issued by international organizations.
The interagency coordination platform Refugees and Migrants (R4V), which coordinates with United Nation agencies, NGOs, and other civil society groups for its statistics, shows that some 7 million Venezuelan migrants have relocated so far. Most have migrated to Colombia (more than 2 million), Peru (more than 1.5 million), and the United States (which, as of September 2022, registered 545,000 who have mostly reached the U.S. by traversing Panama’s Darién Gap).
Afro Venezuelan migrations
My estimations and information gathered in Afro Venezuelan towns from the Network of Afro-Venezuelan Organizations (ROA) show that 15% of the total number of Venezuelans who have migrated to the aforementioned countries are of African descent.
Afro Venezuelan migrants who live in those countries, as well as others who have returned, have spoken of experiencing racism and xenophobia in countries such as Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, and the United States. Migration, according to international law, is a right; the United Nations Human Rights Commission states that “all migrants, regardless of their status, are entitled to the same international human rights as everyone else. As with all rights holders, states have an obligation to migrants to respect, protect, and fulfill their human rights.” Being a migrant should not be a crime. Afro Venezuelans have contributed to the diversification of cultures in the countries they have migrated to. Thanks to Afro Venezuelan migrants, Afro Venezuelan music is now heard in New York and Florida, Colombia, Peru, Spain, France, and Germany, among others, as are our culinary specialities, such as the arepa, hallacas, dulceria, and sancocho cruzado. We have also transported our traditional drinks, spiritual practices, and professional services in the fields of medicine, chemistry, and pharmaceuticals alongside the transcendental understanding we have of sharing, solidarity, and love among Afro Latin Americans.