From Mecca to Maicao: The unlikely heart of Colombia's Muslim community

As the early morning light spills into the streets of the Colombian border city of Maicao, Hassan Dana walks up to his small home appliances shop and lifts the shutter as the city slowly begins to come to life.

Along with his Venezuelan employee, Hassan readies his shop – named Hassuna – for the day’s business, dragging out a number of fans onto the shopfront and displaying a range of toasters and home appliances.

Hassan and his little shop have been in Maicao for 33 years. He left his native Lebanon in the 1990s, eager to seek greater economic support for himself and his family.

“It’s calmer here than over there [in Lebanon]. One can live well working here, Maicao isn’t amazing but it’s better than back home,” he says, surrounded by boxes of electronics and flanked by fans.

"Current-day Maicao is not what it used to be, though the Arab community’s impact on the city is enduring: the city has its own mosque, an Arab school, and a smattering of Arab-run businesses decorate the high street"

Maicao is a small and downtrodden city on the edge of Colombia’s north-western border with Venezuela. The dusty nook lies tucked away in the Colombian province of La Guajira and was once the core of Colombia’s Arab and Muslim communities.

Local impact

Current-day Maicao is not what it used to be, though the Arab community’s impact on the city is enduring: the city has its own mosque, an Arab school, and a smattering of Arab-run businesses decorate the high street.

Not to mention that the city is governed by the Lebanese-Colombian Mohamad Jaafar Dasuki, the first-ever Muslim person to serve as mayor in Colombia’s history.

The Omar Ibn Al-Khattab Mosque pierces the city’s bumpy skyline as evidence of the local community’s foregone might. The imposing marble building is the third largest mosque in all of Latin America and was built in 1997, during the height of the Arab community’s prominence in Maicao.

“The mosque is an icon, it’s a symbol of Maicao,” says Pedro Delgado a local researcher in Maicao’s Arab community.

The mosque has a capacity for approximately 700 people, though nowadays barely 200 attend the Friday prayer, a clear indication of the community’s demise.

Adjacent to the mosque is another emblem of Maicao’s Arab community: The Dar El Arkam school. The institution was once the pride and joy of Maicao’s Arab and Muslim diaspora, with over 1,000 students – the huge majority of which had Arabic roots – spread over two centres in Maicao.

This year, the school has only 252 students in just one centre, of which approximately half have no Arab roots.

“We’re not going through a good moment, the community is in a severe crisis,” says Nasser Gebara, a Lebanese shop owner who has been in Maicao since 1987.

“I’ve thought about going back [to Lebanon] a thousand times, though sometimes I feel that the love that one has for the city is like the blood that runs through your veins, it binds you to the place,” he says.

History of migration

That is a sentiment shared by much of Maicao’s remaining Muslim and Arab communities. Loyalty towards a place that has given many so much, yet also taken its toll.

To understand the growth of Colombia’s – and particularly Maicao’s – Arab community one must look back to the early 20th century. Arab migration to the region dates as far back as the late 1880s as many across the Middle East began to emigrate from the Ottoman Empire.

As the Ottoman Empire crumbled, a few migrating Arabs ended up along the north of Colombia having made their way to cities like Barranquilla and Maicao from their initial entry points across ports in the Caribbean.

The outbreak of civil war in Lebanon in the 1970s brought with it a mass exodus of Lebanese migrants, many of whom settled across the Americas – and a minor portion in Colombia.

“The Arab diaspora [that settled] in Maicao were initially focused on creating small communities where they could maintain an Islamic lifestyle in a context in which Islam was entirely unknown,” says Colombian historian and anthropologist Diego Castellanos, who studies Colombia’s Arab and Muslim communities at the French Institute for Anatolian Studies.

Slowly but surely, the Arab and Muslim community began to establish itself in Maicao, bolstered by the vibrant business opportunities along the border and – most importantly – buoyed by Venezuela’s growing oil economy throughout the 1970s.

"Maicao really is a transitory place for many people. Most of the inhabitants of Maicao see the city as a place of passage, somewhere where one can stay for a few years, make money and go elsewhere"

Maicao’s condition as an economically prosperous border town with little to no regulation also meant that illicit economies and a web of contraband quickly sprung up in the city, bringing with it an influx of cash and economic activity – albeit illegal.

“Many businesses that sought their supply from Maicao set up informal economies where they sold contraband of very high quality. A very serious contraband issue developed,” Pedro Delgado says of the city’s economic boom through the 1980s and 1990s.

Regardless, the Arab community became one of Maicao’s economic drivers as both the city and the diaspora prospered hand in hand, which encouraged Arab migrants to settle in the dusty city.

“Arab businesses, one way or another, greatly influenced the quality of life of the Maicao community,” Pedro adds. 

Diaspora’s demise

The honeymoon period, however, could not last forever. Once neighbouring Venezuela’s economy tanked and the country spiralled into a deep political and economic crisis in the early 2000s, Maicao inevitably took heavy collateral damage.

The seemingly endless economic prospects that once sustained the region eventually came to a standstill, causing the local economy to falter and compelling many Arab diaspora members to seek out better fortunes elsewhere.

“Maicao really is a transitory place for many people. Most of the inhabitants of Maicao see the city as a place of passage, somewhere where one can stay for a few years, make money and go elsewhere,” Diego says.

Additionally, a spike in violence and crime – and kidnappings in particular – throughout the 1990s motivated residents as well as diaspora members to pack their bags and leave Maicao.

Adding fuel to the fire, the Colombian government tightened its control of the previously unregulated passage of goods and migrants across the border thus delivering a blow to the illicit economies that also contributed to the city’s economic growth.

The Arab community, its mosque, school and economic weight plummeted. A community that was once believed to number anywhere between the 5,000 to 8,000 mark, is now expected to be less than 1,000 people strong – though exact figures are hard to ascertain.

“Maicao went through a crisis, it affected commerce and, as the majority of businesses were Arab, many left to find opportunities elsewhere and they took their children with them. It affected [the school],” says Jorge Mendoza, the director of the local Dar El Arkam school.

Despite the trials and tribulations the Maicao’s Arab diaspora has been through a core community remains and generations continue to renew.

Though fewer children run through the corridors of the Dar El Arkam school and the mosque’s prayer room is filled just to a fraction of what it once housed, the community remains integral to Maicao.

“There was a time when they [the Arab diaspora] did feel proud and connected to the things that were done in Maicao, but at the same time, they encouraged younger generations to see Maicao as a starting point for other things.

“The situation of the community in Maicao is not critical, but in the medium term one begins to question how much longer the presence will be felt,” Diego concludes. 

Inigo Alexander is a freelance journalist whose work focuses on Spain, Latin America, and social justice. His work has appeared in The Guardian, The Daily Telegraph, The Local, and NACLA, among others

Follow him on Twitter: @Inigo_Alexander