Jorge Ramirez

Jorge Ramirez is promoting racial equality in the Andean region by forming and training a network of young black leaders to combat the discrimination against black people which permeates Andean society.

Jorge Ramirez is challenging the "invisible racism" that excludes Afro-Peruvians from economic opportunity and leadership positions in their communities and in Peruvian society in general. The first black Peruvian to earn a Doctorate in law, he founded the Black Association for the Defense and Promotion of Human Rights (ASONEDH) eight years ago, and has devised a strategy for the eradication of racism through legal challenges to discriminatory practices, inclusion of black history in school curricula, formation of leaders in majority black communities along the coast, and creation of an economic development unit to broker investment and infrastructure projects between communities, municipalities, ministries and international funding agencies.

ASONEDH is the only organization in Peru to directly address the concerns of the 8-10% of the population who are black, and its combination of legal, economic and educational services to the community is also unique in the country. In Peru, the very few Afro-Peruvian NGOs that exist seem to focus more on cultural expression and identity, on black music and dance, on small groups of Lima-based blacks. Racial discrimination is an issue to which few groups in the region dedicate, especially from the legal and political perspectives. Educating groups who suffer discrimination about their citizenship rights, promoting new leaders from among non-white communities, taking up precedent-setting legal cases are forms of action rarely taken in Peru and the Andean region. Jorge is already working to identify up to 100 young black leaders from around the country to participate in legal and conflict resolution training so that they in turn can educate their communities about black history, civil rights and the importance of political participation. At the same time he is negotiating agreements at the municipal and ministerial levels of government to finance educational, infrastructure and credit programs for predominantly black communities which heretofore have not developed a voice of their own, and have been marginalized from the electoral process.

Jorge has witnessed wide-spread discrimination against Peruvians of African descent throughout the country. Black Peruvians have not achieved the same gains in civil rights as black people in other countries, and they continue to be viewed as inferior and even dangerous by the rest of Peruvian society. To add to this problem, most Afro-Peruvians lack a strong sense of African identity and awareness of their contributions to Andean history. This in part due to the fact that their ancestors did not come directly from Africa, but were brought to Peru in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries after several generations had lived in Panama and Colombia. They were sold as slaves to Peru and most were already converted Catholics, spoke Spanish, had an average age of 11 to 15 years. Their ancestral myths and beliefs, religious rites, and African dress and handicrafts linking them to Africa has disappeared. In the absence of a cultural identity, many Afro-Peruvians have tacitly accepted the racism which has become a part of their daily lives. They have also internalized racist attitudes about themselves, and suffer from extremely low levels of self-esteem.

Though 8-10% of Peru's population, or between 1.4 and 2 million people, is black, their ethnic heritage receives no mention in history texts, except when slavery is discussed. Very few black people hold positions of political, religious or military power and there currently are very few laws which protect black people against discrimination. Black Peruvians typically work in very low level positions with few opportunities for advancement. Furthermore, all Peruvians, black, white and mestizo, are bombarded with negative imagery of black people by a media which continues to portray black people using very derogatory caricatures. Blacks are portrayed as sports heroes, dancers and chefs, but not as leaders. They for the most part do not protest these negative images and accept the racism, as, according to Jorge, the civil rights movement in Peru is decades behind that of the United States and other countries.

Jorge has already begun implementing his idea to educate black Peruvians about their history, their contributions to Peruvian society, and their rights. In 1990 he founded ASONEDH, and as director he has organized and led various seminars in black communities regarding legal education, community organization, leadership formation, the promotion of human and civil rights, and participatory democracy. ASONEDH belongs to the Continental Network of Afro-American Organizations and coordinates the Andean Region Network of Black Organizations. As a lawyer and leader of the Peruvian Black Movement, Jorge has also provided free legal counsel to blacks and other persecuted racial groups in racial discrimination cases. Under his direction, ASONEDH produced Voces Negras (Black Voices), the first Peruvian magazine geared towards

raising the consciousness of the population about the racial problems that exist within the country. Black Voices publishes histories of black communities throughout Peru and the Caribbean, requirements to participate in municipal elections and run for public office, biographies of important black personalities, and declarations on human rights and racism.

Jorge's plan for the next few years is a continuation of the above work to increase awareness of discrimination against black Peruvians, promote change in racist attitudes, and develop laws to protect the rights of Peruvians of African descent. He will achieve these changes by forming a network of 80 to 100 young black community leaders, selected from 20 predominantly black towns in the country's northern and southern zones. Jorge visits each community, gathers together 5 to 10 young people, and trains them on their history, identity, human rights, democracy, and participation. From this group, he and his team select the 3 to 5 most promising to become community leaders who will work throughout Peru, in turn educating their black communities about their African identity and their rights, denouncing the discrimination that is occurring with their newly-acquired legal knowledge, and eventually empowering the communities to take political action. Concurrently they will work with different forms of media to promote the work they are doing and inspire national debate about racism within the region.

To initiate the training of a network of black leaders, Jorge recently sponsored a workshop in Lima entitled "Meeting of Black Community Promoters," bringing together representative community leaders from across Peru. The meeting participants designed a plan to carry out projects on actions for legal promotion and the integrated promotion of children's rights, to be developed in the country's northern and southern zones, respectively. The legal promotion proposal trains community promoters in the knowledge and application of human rights and strategies for conflict solution, transforming them into legal activists in their various communities. Jorge counts on a teams of 7 persons in Lima, another 10 in the southern zone, and another 12 in the northern zone to carry out these projects and train selected participants.

At the end of this process, estimated to be 3 years long, Jorge will convene a meeting in Lima of all the leaders to share the information and experience garnered in the process. They will analyze this information and work together to create the necessary strategies to move forward. These leaders will be encouraged to run for political positions within municipal, state and national government to ensure that African-Peruvians have a voice in the development of the country. Jorge has already seen results in the promotion of black leaders in government positions, as 8 black leaders are running for judge positions and another for mayor after receiving his training and advice.


At the same time, Jorge is meeting with business leaders, as well as government and multilateral financial institutions, to promote economic investment and employment training programs in coastal regions outside Lima with large proportions of black inhabitants. Jorge has already signed a contract with the Ministry of Education to form a commission on the inclusion of black history in school texts and he hopes that in 3 years the Ministry includes black history in all national curriculum. Jorge's ASONEDH is a member of the National Coordination on Human Rights, an organization which unites diverse groups around the issue of human rights, and is recognized as an authority on race issues. Jorge was recently invited by the US Embassy in Peru to travel to southern US states and meet with activists of various human rights organizations. Based on this experience, he drafted Law 26772, Peru's first anti-racism law, which states that work offers and educational materials cannot contain requirements which constitute discrimination or inequality. Organizations from across Europe have already pledged $150,000 over the next three years to carry out Jorge's model to train black leaders in all of Peru. He receives financial support from Holland's ICCO for legal promotion, Diakonia of Switzerland for his work in education, and PACT and the Freidrich Ebert Foundation for training programs. This model will then be replicated throughout the rest of the Andean region, where minority black populations face similar problems.

When Jorge was a young boy he did not at first recognize the discrimination to which he and other black people were being subjected in Peru. As he grew older, his mother began to encourage him to marry a white woman, so that his children would be born of lighter skin color and would hence not have to face the same discrimination that his family and friends did. In his adolescence he began to see for himself that all around him black people were not being treated with respect, and were not given the same opportunities that were available to people of European and Mestizo (mixed) backgrounds. Upon opening his eyes to the plight that black people faced in Peru, he became an active member of a youth group dedicated to the promotion of black culture. He later decided to enter law school to arm himself with the necessary tools to protect the rights of his people.

When he entered law school, authorities there discouraged Jorge from continuing in the program. One professor told him that, because of his color, he would bring shame to the entire profession if he were to become a lawyer. He overcame this outright discrimination and became the first black Peruvian to attain a Doctorate in Law. Since that time he has devoted his life to the promotion of black empowerment through education, legal action and economic programs throughout Peru. While he has clearly been the initiator and the

creator of new ideas to address issues of inequality for black Peruvians, he does not convey a need to be the sole leader behind the movement. Rather, he recognizes the importance of creating a network of leaders so that his ideas can be implemented throughout a large region, and gain enough momentum to have long-term and widespread effects.