Home affairs minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi says gaps in SA's immigration policies have created a free-for-all, resulting in the country dishing out services to foreign nationals at no cost.
As the ANC heads to its policy conference this weekend, the party is proposing a complete overhaul of the immigration system. It says the existing gaps have overburdened some sectors including being abused by those wanting citizenship.
Speaking at Luthuli House on Monday, Motsoaledi, an ANC national executive committee member, outlined some of the proposals the party would be putting forward which include establishing an immigration board that compromises various government departments, civil society as well as organised labour.
The governing party also wants the establishment of special immigration courts.
In recent years, the ANC government has come under immense scrutiny from various opposition parties such as ActionSA and the Patriotic Alliance over its lax immigration policies which some believe had an impact on the party's dismal performance during the 2021 local government elections.
The country has also seen the emergence of civil society groups such as #OperationDudula and the Dudula Movement that have taken matters into their own hands by physically removing foreign nationals living in RDP houses and have stopped them from operating as street vendors.
The tensions between South Africans and foreign nationals culminated with the death of Zimbabwean national Elvis Nyathi, who was killed by an angry mob in Diepsloot after he was asked to produce his ID.
Motsoaledi said at times, the existing immigration policies such as the Refugee Act of 1998 and the Immigration Act of 2002 contradicted each other.
He said as SA moves towards tightening these policies, it was labelled xenophobic, despite doing what other countries such as Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Zimbabwe were already doing.
“These policy gaps are prevalent in the labour market where employers are practicing modern-day slavery by pitting unionised South Africans against illegal foreigners.
“The gaps lead to a situation where asylum seekers, refugees and foreign nationals get resident status and permanent citizenship prematurely and irregularly. The asylum region most of the time is conflated with economic migration. There is no law in SA or policy that relates to economic migration.
“The law speaks to asylum and refugee but anyone who comes here will cook those to come here even if they are economic migrants and this causes problems.”
Motsoaledi said there were many countries in Africa that took in foreigners, refugees and asylum seekers but added those had strict reservations which were in line with the United Nations guidelines about what foreign nationals were entitled to once inside their borders.
In Zambia, he said, the government accepted refugees and foreign nationals but it had a clause that stated it was not legally obligated to provide free primary education. “Now, having noticed and observed all the things I’ve said, we now propose to the policy conference to completely overhaul the immigration system in the country.”
Motsoaledi said citizenship laws must be tightened to prevent undeserving foreign nationals from getting citizenship by default and through fraudulent means and exploit the country for criminal and underhand business activities.
“The ANC-led government must establish an immigration board. At the moment the department that decides on these matters is home affairs and nobody else but whatever decision it takes impacts on work of other government departments.
“We believe SA needs a huge immigration board that includes departments such as trade and industry, health, tourism, revenue services, education as well as international relations. We believe civil society must also form part.
“We’re proposing a special immigration court. The current legislative is untenable and leads to delays in finalising immigration matters. This is because the present situation delays deportation and in many instances people who come here illegally launch high court matters on an urgent basis to stop impending deportation and disappear before court sits.
“This is an elaborative system and can take up to a decade to finalise these matters.”
Motsoaledi conceded the government had no idea how many illegal foreign nationals were currently in the country. “We’re unable to answer this question because of the manner in which the immigration system is designed. If anyone comes here and doesn’t report themselves, you’ll never know.
“If a person comes into SA and doesn’t follow the normal mechanisms then there’s no way we’ll know about them. It’s not practically possible to know,” Motsoaledi admitted.
He emphasised SA was not going against any international law. “What we’re proposing is what other countries have done, are still doing and practicing.”
nkosin@sowetan.co.za
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