El Estatuto Temporal de Protección para migrantes venezolanos en Colombia: Novedad y posibilidades de mejora

In March 2021, the Colombian government approved the Temporary Protection Status (TPS) for migrants from Venezuela. Although temporary protection mechanisms are not new, institutions such as the UNHCR, headed by Filippo Grandi, have described the Colombian mechanism as ‘the most important humanitarian gesture’ in the region since the 1980s and ‘an example for the region and the rest of the world’. Let us consider what makes the Colombian TPS special and how it can be improved.

 

Migration patterns in Latin America have considerably changed after 2015 due to the exodus of over 6.81 million Venezuelans, which currently makes the Venezuelan forced displacement phenomenon one of the largest in the world. The root causes of this phenomenon are the imposition of an autocratic regime and an economic crisis that have caused a complex humanitarian emergency, and a political, institutional, and security crisis.

 

Regarding the categorisation processes of displaced people, in the Latin American context, the refugee definition has been broadened. According to the Cartagena Declaration (1984), refugees are not only persons who have escaped their country due to persecution but also ‘because their lives, security or freedom have been threatened by generalized violence, foreign aggression, internal conflicts, massive violation of human rights or other circumstances which have seriously disturbed public order’. Thus, the definition can incorporate a variety of displaced people, including Venezuelans, and enable them to obtain international protection. However, the contemporary massive and forced displacement of Venezuelans in Latin America has shown that states in the region do not recognise Venezuelans as prima facie refugees except for Brazil and Paraguay.

 

Colombia, the country that has received the largest number of Venezuelans in the last seven years – as of February 2022, 2.47 million – responded first to the phenomenon with ad hoc measures such as the Special Permission to Stay (PEP), which allowed Venezuelans to gain access to healthcare, education and the formal labour market for two years. According to a World Bank study, the PEP helped Venezuelans have better living conditions than other migrants without documents. Nonetheless, the permission came with a series of challenges for Venezuelans, such as its temporality – it only lasted for two years that could be extended –, difficulties in opening bank accounts, and lack of recognition by different sectors in Colombia. In addition, it did not provide a route for durable solutions such as residence permits or citizenship.

 

This situation, along with the almost one million undocumented Venezuelan migrants in the country by January 2021, led the Colombian government to create a Temporary Protection Status (TPS) for migrants from Venezuela. Without recognising Venezuelans as refugees, the beneficiaries of this status have ten years to access Colombian health, education, and formal labour systems. In addition, they will be able to transit to durable solutions. 

 

According to the UNHCR, temporary protection mechanisms are ‘pragmatic “tools” of international protection’. They are ‘complementary to the international refugee protection regime, being used at times to fill gaps in that regime as well as in national response systems and capacity, especially in non-Convention [1951 Refugee Convention] States.’ Although the Colombian response features a series of novelties, globally, temporary protection mechanisms are not new. States have applied them when their refugee regimes have gotten overwhelmed, among other reasons. For instance, Turkey, the US and more recently the European Union – to respond to the Ukrainian forced displacement as a result of the Russian invasion – have used this type of mechanism to either overcome the limitations of the refugee definition of the 1951 Geneva Convention, or to respond to mass forced displacement when the channels to recognise refugees individually are overwhelmed due to the high number of requests. Considering this, what makes the Colombian TPS different?

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1. Its ‘temporality’: The Colombian TPS offers ten years to its beneficiaries to access Colombian institutional services in the health, education, and labour systems, while they collect the requirements to apply for a permanent residence permit.

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2. Path to durable solutions: Once the beneficiaries of the TPS fulfil the requirements, such as five years living in Colombia and approximately 400 USD (which might be a challenge for some people), they can apply for permanent residence. One year after obtaining this visa, they can apply for Colombian citizenship.

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3. Regularising people who were ‘invisible’: The campaign to regularise Venezuelans in Colombia under the TPS has been called ‘Visibles’ by the Colombian Migration Office, setting up a process by which almost one million Venezuelans that were undocumented by January 2021 have had the possibility of obtaining a regular status in Colombia. As of July 2022, 1,511,003 permits have been approved, and 2,326,968 people have registered to be beneficiaries of the TPS in only 14 months.

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