Venezuelans Flee to City From Chavez

A Venezuelan constitutional referendum set for Sunday that would pave the way for Hugo Chavez to become president for life could, if it passes, increase the already substantial flow of those fleeing the country for New York City.

In recent years, New York City has become a prime destination for refugees from the Chavez regime. Many of them say they left in fear of just what is happening right now in their country as the socialist strongman moves to consolidate power.

In 2000, there were 6,700 Venezuelans in New York, according to the census — a relatively tiny number compared to the city's other Latin American immigrant communities. But the number is on its way to doubling. Last year, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated the number of Venezuelans living here to be more than 10,600.

Among them are young people who have come to study in American universities — a traditional pilgrimage for the children of the well-to-do in Venezuela — and have decided to stay as job opportunities in Venezuela shrink. Some are professionals who have dropped long-held plans to return home when they reach the age of retirement.

Many say their decisions to come — or stay longer than planned — were directly linked to the changes Mr. Chavez has implemented as a part of his "revolution," now in its eighth year. Since 1999, Mr. Chavez has nationalized the oil industry, decreased press freedom, and pushed for changes to the constitution. He has taken a harsh line against America and welcomed the president of Iran to his country.

Indira Villalobos, 30, left Venezuela to try out Bohemian living in New York City and learn English for a year shortly after President Chavez came to power in 1999. Six years later, she says she has no plans to return to a country she no longer recognizes.

Tulio Gomez, 40, used to visit New York often to promote his beachside bed and breakfast, the Blue Paradise, where he took tourists deep-sea fishing and diving off the coast of Venezuela. Just after Mr. Chavez came to power, he sold the business, enrolled in a design program at the New School, and embarked on a new career and life in New York.

For two decades, Luis Quintero, 47, kept one foot in Venezuela, his home country, and one foot in New York. But after watching in dismay as Mr. Chavez strengthened his grip on the Venezuelan government, Mr. Quintero sold his house near Caracas where he had planned to spend his twilight years. Instead, he opened El Cocotero Restaurant in Chelsea to cater to the burgeoning Venezuelan immigrant community here.

"I moved here, because, actually, I was afraid. I was predicting what is happening right now," Mr. Gomez said of his decision to give up the Blue Paradise.

Mr. Gomez says conditions in Venezuela, including rising crime and long lines to buy staples such as milk and sugar, have confirmed his early fears about the Chavez administration.

"It is just getting worse and worse," he said. "He's a really aggressive person, and he's very violent. Whoever's not with him is his enemy."
But for Venezuelans, even New York, is not a total escape from Mr. Chavez. In 2005, Mr. Chavez set up a program to subsidize heating oil for low-income residents of the South Bronx with a portion of Venezuela's vast reserves. He is also funding several community initiatives in the neighborhood.

Some Chavez critics say they are troubled that Mr. Chavez has followed them here, even as they tried to leave him behind. "It may help people in the South Bronx, but it's not really innocent," said Carlos Brillembourg, 57, an architect. "If you take money from Chavez, it's like getting money from a drug dealer. It's corrupt."

For a few, the South Bronx program supports their theory that Mr. Chavez aspires to be like the Cuban leader, Fidel Castro. In the past, Mr. Castro has used Harlem as an occasional stage to promote his government and simultaneously thumb his nose at America.

Gabriel Duran, 47, a Venezuelan immigrant and owner of a Manhattan-based computer consulting company, said some Chavez critics here have dubbed their country "Venecuba."

A psychotherapist who moved from Venezuela 20 years ago, and who has many Venezuelan patients, Emma Matos, said some of the newer arrivals have come fleeing the "specter" of Fidel Castro.

Although she declined to discuss her own views on Mr. Chavez, she said, "I know some families who came because they were feeling afraid of losing their rights," adding that a few of her patients are Cuban-Venezuelans who had previously fled Cuban communism.

The leader of a branch of the national anti-Chavez group Civil Resistance of Venezuelans in the Exterior, Eglys Broslat, 55, said she turned to the Cuban-American community several years ago for advice on organizing protests against Mr. Chavez. At first, they were able to gather hundreds of Venezuelans and Cubans alike to stage rowdy demonstrations.

Yet as the number of Venezuelans has grown, Ms. Broslat said participation in the anti- Chavez protests has waned. At a demonstration this month in front of the Venezuelan Consulate — which did not respond to several requests for comment for this article — she said only 20 people showed up.

Ms. Broslat said she is not sure why the influx of Venezuelans, most from the middle and upper classes that are largely antagonistic to the Chavez administration, has not helped fuel her movement, although the scattering of Venezuelan arrivals across the city doesn't help, she said. There is a small enclave of Venezuelans in the Jackson Heights section of Queens, but Venezuelans interviewed for this article also lived in the Upper East Side, Forest Hills, East Harlem, and Windsor Terrace.

"There's no neighborhood. Venezuelans, they live everywhere. They don't have a community like Dominicans or Colombians," Ms. Broslat said.

Some may be afraid to speak out. Several people interviewed for this article declined to discuss Mr. Chavez, saying they feared a backlash against relatives back home.

In addition, many of the newest arrivals are young Venezuelan artists and students who may be more ambivalent about their homeland and the changes taking place there.

"Chavez, at the beginning, he was doing a great job, we were like wow, we are going to have a new Venezuela," Ms. Villalobos, who now designs jewelry and sells it to boutiques and her friends, said.

One of her brothers, who trained as a lawyer, has been unable to find work in Venezuela, while another brother who studied interior design has barely kept afloat. She said increases in crime and poverty have transformed her country into an unfamiliar place that no longer feels like home.

Nevertheless, when Mr. Chavez began the South Bronx oil program, Ms. Villalobos signed up. She even traveled with a group of Bronx families on a trip to Venezuela as a translator to thank Mr. Chavez for his generosity, where she met the president herself.

"It's not that I don't agree with what he's doing," she said. "But then he started getting crazy — like helping other countries, instead of helping us."