Information in: 

English


Hindi, Urdu, Punjabi


Korean


Japanese


German


Swedish


Spanish

870 Market Street
Suite 1028
San Francisco, CA
94102

(415) 391-0228

Louzolo Agostinho
Angolan Petroleum Engineer and Asylee

by David N. Strand

I had handled many immigration matters for Chevron, which operated in nearly 100 countries and transfers personnel around the world on a regular basis. Louzolo Agostinho (“Augie”) had earned a Master’s Degree in Petroleum engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and worked for several years for Chevron Overseas Petroleum (COPI) in Angola. When we first met, Augie was working for COPI at the Chevron facility in San Ramon, California, as a trainee in exchange visitor status. Many large corporations have their own J-1 training programs, which are limited to eighteen months. Augie and his family wanted to remain in the United States. Chevron petitioned many of its foreign employees for permanent residence, primarily through the category for multi-national transferees, and others through individual labor certifications, the procedure through which American employers must demonstrate to the Labor Department that they are unable to find qualified Americans.

Chevron was unwilling to sponsor Augie for permanent residence. Since Angola was in the throws of civil war and since Augie was a member of an ethnic group that had suffered extensive persecution as a result of that struggle, I suggested asylum.

Angola had been wracked by civil war since independence from Portugal in 1975. The competing factions were largely ethnic based. The central government, ruled by MPLA, the People’s Movement for the Liberation of Angola, which controlled about half of the land, was predominately Kimbundu, the ethnic group that predominates in central Angola, around the capital city, Luanda. The primary opposition group, UNITA (the National Union for the Total Independence of Angola) which ruled most of the south was primarily Ovinbundu. The conflict between MPLA and UNITA was greatly intensified by financial, political, and military support by the great powers competing in the global cold war. The Soviet Union and its allies supported the MPLA. The United States and South Africa supported UNITA. Foreign troops from Cuba and South Africa were in active combat in Angola.

The third and smallest political faction, the National Front for the Liberation of Angola (FNLA) represented primarily Bakongo people who predominated in the north, which was part of the area that once constituted the ancient Kingdom of Kongo, where European colonial powers had divided the Bakongo people into the Belgian Congo (now Republic of Congo/ capital Kinshasha), the French Congo (now Republic of Congo/ capital Brazzaville), and Portuguese Angola, where the northeastern province is named Zaire.

In 1995 when we submitted Augie’s asylum application, several peace negotiations had collapsed and both major participants in the civil war precipitated massive human rights abuses. Thousands were killed. Horrible excesses were perpetrated on “Bloody Sunday,” November 1, 1992, when police raids throughout Luanda, the capital, went door to door killing thousands whose ethnic identity suggested that might be opponents of the ruling MPLA. Hundreds were arrested and either shot while in custody or subjected to brutal torture. Amnesty International estimated between several hundreds and 3,000 people were killed. A later wave of killings occurred on Friday, January 22, 1993, known as “Bloody Friday,” this time directed almost exclusively at Bakongo. The families of several of my clients were killed that day.

Amnesty International refers to such incidents as “extrajudicial executions” and similar atrocities occurred throughout Angola. In support of the asylum applications we submitted reports by Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, and the U.S. State Department’s Country Report on Human Rights Practices, in addition to newspaper and magazine articles.

Louzolo Agostinho had left Angola to study at the Colorado School of Mines in 1992. He returned to Angola, on vacation, from May to August 1993. Two weeks after he left his house it was ransacked by four armed men in army and police uniforms. Of the six people in the house at the time, three were killed, including two of his cousins and the fiancée of a cousin.

Augie believed that the marauders were after him because he embodied all the Bakongo characteristics resented and detested by the government. He is, like many Bakongo, a well-educated intellectual. His father was a founder of FNLA. Fouor of his cousins were FNLA soldiers. The whole family belongs to the Church of Jesus Christ upon the Earth by the Prophet Simon Kimbangu, a native African Church disfavored by the predominately Catholic regime.

Augie was granted asylum. He and his family now reside in California. As the regional leader for the western United States of the Kimbanguist Church, he was in touch with many other Bankongo in America and referred several to our office to seek asylum.

Since that time I have represented several other Bakongo who suffered great atrocities from the murder of close relatives to politically motivated rape. Two of the most intriguing cases were from Cabinda, an enclave near the mouth of the Congo River separated by a few miles from the rest of Angola . The politics of Cabinda is uniquely complicated, with its own liberation movement. During the Cold War the mixture of local politics and the global confrontation between the Soviet Union and the United States and its allies made for one of the most bizarre and ironic political situations in the world. Cabinda is oil rich, and the Angolan government, supported by the Soviet Union, derived significant revenues from the oil fields of Cabinda. The Chevron Corporation is the major driller in Cabinda, and the Chevron oil fields were a target for guerilla fighters of the military wing of FLEC, the Cabindan Liberation Front. Because Angolan government troops were busy fighting UNITA, they appealed to the Soviet Union for help in Cabinda. The Soviet Union sought assistance from its client state, Cuba, so Cuban troops were sent to Cabinda. The incongruous result: Cuban troops circling the Chevron oil fields to protect them from FARC. Communist Cuban troops protecting a giant capitalist American oil firm!

I initially speculated about how the petroleum engineers from Texas and California interacted with Castro’s soldiers. In fact, there was no interaction. Chevron employees worked for a month at a time exclusively within the confines of the Chevron compound and then flew directly home for a month of rest.

Today, the human rights situation has improved, but not much. We still have active cases. It has been a great pleasure to befriend several Bakongo from Angola, most of whom have been devout members of the Kimbanguist Church.

At a recent surprise birthday party for Augie, he thanked the Lord for the good fortune of his family escaping Angola to America, the land of freedom and opportunity. With my tongue in cheek, I suggested that he was not unlike the many priests, ministers, and other religious workers that I have represented – they always thank the Lord and tend to downplay their gratitude to their immigration lawyer. Augie had a quick and satisfying response to my complaint: “The Lord works through you, David.”

Representing asylum applicants often does seem to be working on the side of the Lord. I have handled asylum cases from throughout the world, from countries as diverse as Mongolia, Nicaragua, Uganda, Northern Ireland, Israel, China, and Iran. These cases have afforded me a great opportunity to probe deeply into complex political and sociological situations throughout the world. The pattern of persecution towards those whose ethnicity or religion or political opinion differs from their political rulers is sadly an ongoing tragedy. In general I believe that immigration lawyers benefit our nation greatly by helping bring to America individuals who add immeasurably to the energy, creativity, and cultural richness of our society. Helping those seeking asylum is probably the most essential and meaningful service we provide.