After traveling for more than a year by ship, bus and car from Africa in hope of reaching the United States, Simon Gyamfi found himself stuck in a remote tourist resort on the coast of Colombia with thousands of other migrants.
NECOCLI After traveling for more than a year by ship, bus and car from Africa in hope of reaching the United States, Simon Gyamfi found himself stuck in a…
By Steven Grattan NECOCLI, Colombia (Reuters) - After traveling for more than a year by ship, bus and car from Africa in hope of reaching the United S.
By Steven Grattan NECOCLI, Colombia (Reuters) - After traveling for more than a year by ship, bus and car from Africa in hope of reaching the United States, Simon Gyamfi found himself stuck in a remote tourist resort on the coast of Colombia with thousands of other migrants. The 42-year-old carpenter, a Christian, fled his home in Ghana because of a dispute with his late wife s Muslim family, he said, and took a month-long ocean voyage to Brazil. The closure of borders due to the coronavirus pandemic left him stranded there for months. Now, after the frontiers finally reopened, he has made his way by road to the northern Colombian town of Necocli, a gateway for migrants heading northward into Central America. Every year, thousands of migrants pass through the small town, looking to catch a boat across the Gulf of Uraba toward the jungles of the Darien Gap on the isthmus of Panama. There, people smugglers guide groups across the wild, road-less region, one of the most treacherous barrie