The Colombian community in London - Geography - Queen Mary ...

orrowed the money to buy the permit and her plane ticket. Adriana had been working as a
check-out operator before she left but she thought she could earn more in London. She was
directly contracted to work as a waitress in a hotel in Kensington High Street. She was
employed there for several years until she got pregnant and was sacked from her job. She had
been working for the past 10 years as a house cleaner and supporting her 17 year old son.
She had a British passport that she obtained when she married her Colombian partner whom
she met in London (he already had a passport).
The armed conflict in Colombia emerged as important in the political motivations for migration
among some Colombians, mainly those who arrived in the 1990s (see above). For example,
José (interviewed in 2010) was 37 years old and from Antioquia. José fled Colombia is 1996
when the political situation was especially difficult; he lived in a farming community where he
had a small business selling beer and liquor. However, he kept receiving death threats from
both the guerrilla and paramilitaries. Because he feared for his life, José decided to use all his
savings to fly to London where he claimed asylum on arrival at the airport. He first worked as
a painter when he arrived but then he managed to set-up his own clothes shop. It is important
to reiterate that political factors invariably intersected with economic and social issues in
prompting people to migrate.
Many of those who fled Colombia for political reasons were associated with the political Left.
For example, Luz Maria (interviewed in 2005), a 46 year-old from Pereira, was the former
secretary of the local Unión Patriótica (UP) or Patriotic Union, which is the political wing of the
FARC. 3 Just after the party won some local elections in 1999, she and her brother, who was
the president, were targeted. Luz Maria was shot in the leg in a gun fight with the
paramilitaries, resulting in the need for six operations. She fled from Colombia as soon as she
recovered, still fearing for her life.
3 The UP was established in 1985 as part of a series of peace processes and negotiations with the
President of the time, Belisario Betancur (elected in 1982). While the UP was made-up of some
former guerrilla members, it also comprised a host of left-leaning members whose aim was to reform
the Colombian state, reduce poverty, social injustice and address unequal land distribution. However,
despite winning of widespread popular support including 14 seats in Congress in 1986, the UP was
allowed little freedom to operate and thousands of its members were threatened and killed throughout
the 1980s and 1990s (Dudley, 2004).
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