http://www.sfltimes.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=16125&Itemid=331
Black immigration in spotlight
Written by MOHAMED HAMALUDIN
Thursday, 22 May 2014
MIAMI-DADE -- A five-year-old national organization focusing on black
immigration to the United States will hold three days of talks this weekend
in Miami's Little Haiti neighborhood.
The "Black Immigration Network Kinship Assembly: A Gathering for Action"
conference will also discuss racial justice and continue its pursuit of
unity among the diverse segments of the black immigrant Diaspora as a means
of economic advancement.
The conference is being hosted by the Brooklyn, N.Y.-based, Black
Immigration Network and co-hosted by local grassroots organizations such as
the Florida Immigrant Coalition, the Dream Defenders, Power U,
Haitian Women of Miami, Florida New Majority and the Caribbean Lawyers
Association.
It will take place Friday, May 23, through Sunday, May 25, at the Little
Haiti Cultural Center, 212 NE 59th Terr., coinciding with the culmination
of the month-long celebration of Haitian Heritage Month.
Using the theme "Rising Together," an expected 150 community leaders from
around the nation will seek "to build transformative change and mutual
understanding between African Americans and African immigrants on issues of
race, culture and identity," according to an announcement from the
organizers. The Center for American Progress reported that, in 2013, black
immigrants comprised more than three million people or eight percent of the
U.S. population born overseas.
More than half of those were from the Caribbean, with the rest mostly
coming from Northern Africa and sub-Saharan Africa, with a small number
from Europe and Canada. They comprise more than one-quarter of the black
population in New York, Boston and Miami.
In terms of the Caribbean, Jamaica and Haiti have ranked among the top
countries sending immigrants, followed by Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago.
Most of the black immigrants, especially those from the Caribbean,
immigrate legally through family ties. The center says refugees from
Ethiopia, Somalia, Liberia, Sudan and Eritrea accounted for 30 percent of
all black African immigrants in 2009 and around one-fifth of black African
immigrants came through the U.S. government's lottery program which offers
55,000 visas each year to countries from which few immigrants come. The
center also says that around 400,000 black undocumented immigrants live in
the country.
According to BIN, the rate of detention and deportation for black
immigrants is five times that of other immigrant groups.
Any plan for comprehensive immigration reform, the group says, must deal
with the "critical concerns and unique issues" which black immigrants face.
According to the center, some 12.5 percent of black immigrants were without
jobs in 2011, representing the highest jobless rate of any foreign-born
group.
In addition, BIN says, while black immigrants have high levels of formal
education and English proficiency, their earnings are relatively low. The
group says that, in 2007, the median annual earnings for black immigrants
were $27,000, or just slightly higher than the $26,000 average for all
immigrants, but 20 percent less than the average of $33,000 for U.S.-born
workers.
"Black immigrants and African Americans have the highest unemployment,
highest incarceration, lowest wages and many more challenges facing us.
This is our attempt to rectify that because our communities deserve justice
and dignity and we should have a fighting chance," said Opal Tometi,
co-director of Black Alliance for Just Immigration (BAJI), a BIN member
group.
BIN says its goal is to unite the various black immigration groups and
focus on the issues they face, which it blames on current immigration
policy.
"We believe that the struggle for immigrant rights is one of the
cutting-edge issues in the fight for racial justice and democracy in the
United States today," the group states on its website. "Racism and economic
globalization has created displacement and poverty in all of our
communities and countries. Black immigrants, other immigrants of color and
people of color in general are being exploited and scapegoated for many of
the economic problems the U.S. has experienced."
Trina Jackson, of the Boston-based Network for Immigrants and African
Americans in Solidarity, calls for an end to what she describes as African
Americans being pitted against immigrants. "We embrace and love one another
and know that our commitment to justice is a commitment to all of us," she
said.
That's the view also of Donald Anthonyson, an organizer with the New
York-based Families for Freedom.
"It is important in this heightened moment for Afro Immigrants and African
Americans to continue to traverse the bridges that were built during past
struggles like the civil rights fights, the various independence movements
and the dismantling of the racist apartheid system," he said.
The goal of this weekend's meeting, the group says, "is to develop a
network that nurtures relationships among black-led organizations, build
collective strategies for justice, and provide support to make their work
more effective."
It has already done some work in that direction.
BIN says it adopted a "10 Principles for Just and Inclusive Immigration
Reform" platform in March 2013 and also mobilized hundreds of African
Americans and black immigrants for a national rally at the U.S. Capitol.
It also established a partnership with the Congressional Black Caucus and
organized a panel for the caucus' annual Legislative Conference in 2013 on
"Pan African Immigration Reform."
Registration information for the "Black Immigration Network Kinship
Assembly: A Gathering for Action" conference may be found at
http://blackimmigration.net
Received on Fri May 23 2014 - 08:01:32 EDT