Elorza is a town in the Apure State in

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

. Elorza is on the region of the Venezuelan Llanos and it had 26.800 inhabitants as of 2012. It is the capital of the Rómulo Gallegos

Municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality'' may also mean the go ...

. The current mayor is Solfreddy Solorzano. This town had shared its

urban area An urban area, built-up area or urban agglomeration is a human settlement with a high population density and infrastructure of built environment. Urban areas are created through urbanization and are categorized by urban morphology as cities ...

with the neighboring Colombia until the government of

Eleazar López Contreras José Eleazar López Contreras (5 May 1883 – 2 January 1973) was the president of Venezuela between 1935 and 1941. He was an army general and one of Juan Vicente Gómez's collaborators, serving as his War Minister from 1931. In 1939, López C ...

. Back then the Venezuelan part was called Elorza, honoring the Venezuelan hero Andrés Elorza, and the Colombian part was called El Viento (The Wind) In August 2001, Venezuela completed a nationwide conversion of land-line phones to three-digit area codes and seven-digit local numbers. Elorza, Mantecal and Bruzual now have the area code 240.

Geography

It is in the region of the Venezuelan Llanos in the Apure State, it is located at and is east of the Colombian border. It is at the side of the Arauca River and in the middle of a plain used for agriculture at 95 meters over the sea level. Its Area Code is 240 and its

postal code A postal code (also known locally in various English-speaking countries throughout the world as a postcode, post code, PIN or ZIP Code) is a series of letters or digits or both, sometimes including spaces or punctuation, included in a postal a ...

is 7011. Roads to the town are two: One that connects it to Mantecal and Bruzual, th
Troncal 19 Road
the other that connects it to La Trinidad de Orichuna and

Guasdualito Guasdualito is a city and episcopal see in the landlocked Apure State, in southern Venezuela. Description The city is the capital of Páez Municipality, in the Distrito Especial Alto Apure. It has an important location on the border between ...

, th
Via El Caribe Road
Elorza also has access to the

Arauca river The Arauca River ( es, Río Arauca) rises in the Andes Mountains of north-central Colombia and ends at the Orinoco in Venezuela. For part of its run it is the boundary between Colombia and Venezuela. The major city on its banks is Arauca, Col ...

which allows fluvial transportation and an airport

Etymology

The antique Misión de San José de Arichuna, with time became known as El Viento, this town grew and spread along the Venezuelan-Colombian border. On March 10, 1866 the Legislative Assembly of the Apure State decided that the part of the population that was in the Venezuelan part become known as Elorza, honoring the

Colonel Colonel (abbreviated as Col., Col or COL) is a senior military officer rank used in many countries. It is also used in some police forces and paramilitary organizations. In the 17th, 18th and 19th centuries, a colonel was typically in charge o ...

José Andrés Elorza, who was a Venezuelan independence Hero. This decision was executed the day 12th of that same month. The name of José Andrés Elorza was chosen since he had joined the army of Paez with the rank captain in La Trinidad de Orichuna, a nearby town to El Viento

Economy

In March 2018, Elorza began to issue its own currency, in response to the

hyperinflation In economics, hyperinflation is a very high and typically accelerating inflation. It quickly erodes the real value of the local currency, as the prices of all goods increase. This causes people to minimize their holdings in that currency as t ...

of the hard bolívar.

References

{{reflist Populated places in Apure