A day after Africa Day and an urgent security cluster meeting on escalating anti-illegal immigration marches, South Africa again finds itself trapped in one of its most emotionally charged national debates.
Yet beneath the slogans, outrage and political posturing lies a difficult but necessary question: can the blanket use of the word “xenophobia” sometimes shut down legitimate discussion, prevent proper analysis and shield those responsible for policy failures from accountability? The question is uncomfortable precisely because xenophobia is real.
South Africa has experienced violent attacks against foreign nationals in the past. Innocent people have been assaulted, displaced and, in some cases, killed. Such actions are indefensible and must be condemned without qualification.
However, the existence of xenophobia does not automatically mean every concern about immigration, border control, undocumented migration, pressure on public services, labour competition and governance failures is irrational hatred. Xenophobia is generally defined as “an irrational fear, hatred or deep-seated prejudice directed specifically at people from other countries or cultures”.
The operative word is irrational. The challenge in South Africa is determining when hostility towards foreign nationals crosses into irrational prejudice and when criticism is directed instead at state failure, weak immigration enforcement, economic competition, organised crime or broader governance collapse. This distinction matters.
South Africa has hosted migrants for generations. Long before democracy, foreign nationals from neighbouring countries worked in mines, households, farms and businesses. Malawian, Zimbabwean, Mozambican and Basotho communities became woven into township and working-class life.
Many South Africans grew up alongside families with surnames such as Banda, Mondlane or Mosikili without perceiving them as outsiders. Some local radio dramas even reflected regional accents as part of ordinary social life.
This historical coexistence complicates simplistic claims that South Africans are inherently xenophobic people. What has changed is the scale, visibility and context of migration after 1994.
According to official estimates, the country has about 2.4-million documented foreign nationals, while justice and constitutional development minister Mmamoloko Kubayi estimated undocumented migrants at about 3-million. Whether one accepts the higher estimates or not, there is little dispute South Africa has become one of the continent’s largest migrant destinations.
Unlike refugee situations elsewhere in the world, migrants and undocumented foreign nationals in South Africa largely live within already strained communities rather than in separate camps or designated settlements.
They share access to clinics, schools, housing, transport systems and informal economic opportunities with millions of poor South Africans who are themselves battling unemployment, inequality, infrastructure collapse and failing local government services. None of this justifies violence or scapegoating. But it does explain why the issue generates tension.
Too often, however, public debate moves immediately from concern to condemnation. The moment immigration pressures are raised, discussions are sometimes shut down through moral labelling rather than deeper engagement.
This can have the unintended consequence of suppressing legitimate debate while allowing governments and institutions to evade scrutiny for their own failures. South Africans are repeatedly told not to associate crime with foreign nationals because crime has always existed locally. That is true.
South Africa has long suffered from violent crime. However, official correctional services statistics also indicate about 27,000 foreign nationals are currently incarcerated in South African prisons, with hundreds serving lengthy sentences and hundreds more serving life imprisonment.
Acknowledging such figures is not inherently xenophobic; it becomes xenophobic only when criminality by some individuals is used to demonise entire communities. The same principle applies to labour exploitation.
Businesses that knowingly employ undocumented migrants at exploitative wages contribute directly to labour market distortions, worker resentment and social instability. Yet public anger is often directed almost exclusively at migrants themselves while employers escape accountability.
Likewise, the South African state bears significant responsibility for inconsistent border management, corruption within immigration systems and weak enforcement of existing laws. Other African governments must also confront uncomfortable questions.
Migration patterns are often driven by economic collapse, political instability, corruption, conflict, disputed elections and governance failures within countries of origin. Ignoring these root causes while framing South Africa as uniquely intolerant oversimplifies a far more complex continental challenge.
Given South Africa’s own inability to resolve longstanding domestic crises such as unsafe pit toilets for many of its own citizens, the belief that Pretoria’s condemnation of disputed elections or governance failures in neighbouring countries would somehow miraculously solve those states’ problems and prevent migration is not entirely convincing.
Faced with an estimated 4-million undocumented migrants living within already strained communities, many South Africans’ growing frustration with government responses is understandable, particularly when the scale of the challenge appears far greater than current interventions acknowledge.
Some neighbouring states whose citizens are able to access employment opportunities, schooling, healthcare and social infrastructure elsewhere, while also sending remittances back home that contribute to local economies and tax revenues, may have little immediate incentive to actively discourage outward migration.
These realities do not justify hostility toward migrants, but they do complicate simplistic narratives that frame the issue purely as prejudice rather than as part of a broader regional governance and economic crisis.
South Africa has contributed significantly to African and international solidarity efforts. It remains one of the largest contributors to the African Union budget and continues to support regional peacekeeping and international legal initiatives.
Ordinary South Africans have also strongly supported their government’s stance on Palestine despite the political and economic risks involved. Many South Africans therefore reject suggestions that the country is broadly hostile to foreigners, Africans in particular, or is somehow ungrateful for anti-apartheid solidarity.
At the same time, South Africans must guard against allowing economic frustration to harden into ethnic hostility or collective blame. Once communities begin seeing entire nationalities as threats, the line between policy concern and prejudice becomes dangerously thin.
The real danger lies at both extremes of the debate. On one side are those who exploit anti-immigrant sentiment for political mobilisation, often using inflammatory rhetoric that risks legitimising violence.
On the other side are those who reduce every immigration concern to xenophobia, thereby avoiding serious engagement with border management, urban planning, public resource allocation, labour regulation and regional diplomacy.
Neither approach solves the problem. South Africa requires a mature national conversation that can simultaneously reject xenophobia and acknowledge legitimate governance concerns.
It must be possible to condemn violence against foreign nationals while also demanding effective immigration systems, lawful documentation processes and accountable governance.
Defence minister Angie Motshekga’s admission that the government does not currently have sufficient resources to fully secure the country’s borders is precisely the type of honesty that creates space for more credible public discussion.
A democracy weakens when citizens are told certain subjects cannot be discussed honestly. Equally, it weakens when vulnerable groups become convenient scapegoats for broader state failure. South Africa’s immigration debate should not be reduced to slogans.
It requires nuance, evidence, empathy and political courage. Most importantly, it requires distinguishing between hatred and accountability because confusing the two may ultimately prevent the country from addressing either effectively.
- Mokhine is the executive director at the Freedom of Expression Institute.
Would you like to comment on this article?
Sign up (it's quick and free) or sign in now.
Please read our Comment Policy before commenting.