1.3 million Zimakwerekwere to be evicted from SA

South Africa is preparing to forcibly deport the up to 1.3 million Zimbabweans that did not apply to regularise their stay before the 31 December deadline. Preparations are already made for the mass exodus.

According to the South African Ministry of Home Affairs, more than 275,000 Zimbabwean nationals living illegally in the country had applied to regularise their stay in South Africa within the deadline.

The Ministry's Director-General, Mkuseli Apleni, said that all the applications would be treated by March this year. Mr Apleni indicated the number of applications was greater than expected. "No one would be deported until the all the applications had been processed," the Ministry informed yesterday.

However, there are an estimated 1.5 million Zimbabweans living in South Africa, many of whom migrated as a result of the social and economic unrest in Zimbabwe in recent years. Most did not qualify for a South African residence application because they are unemployed or only have part-time jobs.

Up to 1.3 million of these Zimbabweans are therefore now risking deportation. The Ministry of Home Affairs has confirmed that Zimbabweans hereafter deemed as illegal immigrants will be arrested and deported to Zimbabwe.

Zimbabweans in South Africa and outside claim that many were not given a fair chance to apply as the Zimbabwe government was not cooperative in providing Zimbabwean passports. Passports were needed to present an application for South African residence.

South African human rights activists further criticise the process, fearing that the planned arrests and mass deportations will further push exiled Zimbabweans underground, exposing the further to poverty and crime. Many, employed in the informal sector and therefore not qualified to apply, would therefore lose their livelihood.

In South Africa, where the unemployment rate is now over 25 percent, the forced eviction of illegal immigrants is however widely welcomed by the population.

Meanwhile, plans are made on both sides of the border for the announced forced exodus. The International Organisation for Migration (IOM) today announced it has "begun to implement a contingency plan to provide humanitarian assistance to Zimbabwean migrants" who will probably forcibly returned from South Africa in a few months.

"IOM, together with humanitarian partners and the Zimbabwean and South African governments will provide humanitarian and protection assistance to vulnerable returnees, including unaccompanied minors," the organisation said today.

Under the plan, two major reception and support centres at Zimbabwe's borders with South Africa and Botswana are already being equipped with large quantities of non-food items including tents and blankets.

The two locations - Beitbridge and Plumtree - are principal points for cross border traffic for Zimbabwean migrants and opened for forcibly returned migrants already in 2006 and 2008. The two centres have already assisted some 437,000 Zimbabweans returnees, but never received such a great wave that may be expected later this year.

From the two reception and support centres, the expected 1.3 million Zimbabwean returnees are to be reintegrated into society. For this, plans are vaguer, and normal Zimbabwe government and international community development schemes somehow must find shelter and employment opportunities for the returnees.

But Zimbabwe has yet to recover from its political and economic meltdown. Zimbabweans in South Africa know there is currently little hope for their future in Zimbabwe. Many will seek to go underground in South Africa rather than being sent home.

- Afrol News

SOUTH AFRICA-ZIMBABWE: No deportations until March

JOHANNESBURG, 7 January 2011 (IRIN) - Undocumented Zimbabwean migrants were given until 31 December 2010 to regularize their stay in South Africa, but this has been extended to 31 March, and problems with issuing passports by the Zimbabwean authorities could delay the process even further.

"There will be no deportations until the end of March," said Ricky Naidoo, spokesman for the South African Department of Home Affairs.

In September 2010 South Africa announced a moratorium on deporting Zimbabweans and said it would allow migrants until 31 December to regularize their stay by applying for work, business or study permits.

The lull in deportations will give the department time to process more than 275,000 applications for permits received from Zimbabwean migrants. "We are trying our best to complete the adjudication process in the next few weeks," Naidoo said.

The South African government relaxed its requirements as the 31 December deadline approached and now awaits a variety of outstanding documents, including passports, to process the applications.

Zimbabwean migrant rights organizations in South Africa, such as the Zimbabwe Exiles Forum (ZEF), and People Against Suffering, Suppression, Oppression and Poverty (PASSOP), expressed their appreciation.

"They [the South African government] even accepted applications with just birth certificates and, in some instances, not even that," said Braam Hanekom of PASSOP.

The two NGOs are helping migrants who have applied for permits to obtain the required documents. The biggest problem was getting a Zimbabwean passport.

Only about a sixth of the estimated Zimbabwean irregular migrant population applied for legal status

Earlier this week, the Zimbabwean registrar general's office indefinitely suspended the production of passports, temporary travelling documents, and other documents such as national identity cards and birth certificates, after saying an electrical fault had affected its database in the capital, Harare.

ZEF's Gabriel Shumba estimated that at least 100,000 applications for South African permits had been submitted without passports.

Naidoo said South Africa had offered to help the Zimbabwean government issue the passports, but refused to comment on whether the offer had been accepted. So far, 42,779 applications had been finalized and approved, 10,166 were awaiting review, and 222,817 were awaiting adjudication.

The Zimbabwean daily newspaper, The Herald, which supports the ruling-ZANU-PF party, on 7 January quoted Registrar-General Tobaiwa Mudede as saying that they would start issuing passports again on 10 January.

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"But will that help? They have a tremendous backlog," Shumba noted. Thousands of Zimbabweans who went home to obtain identity documents have been left stranded.

Kaajal Ramjathan-Keogh, head of the refugee and migrant programme at Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR), a South African organization, told IRIN that the Zimbabwean authorities had been issuing 500 passports a day before they suspended production.

The price of not applying

Hundreds of thousands of Zimbabwean migrants could face deportation from South Africa, "as only about a sixth of the estimated Zimbabwean irregular migrant population applied for legal status," the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said in a statement.

"There are an estimated 1.5 million Zimbabweans living in South Africa, many of whom migrated as a result of the social and economic unrest in Zimbabwe in recent years."

The organization has reception centres for refugees at the Beitbridge border crossing from Zimbabwe to South Africa and in Plumtree, the main border crossing between Zimbabwe and Botswana, and is on standby to provide free transportation to deportees. With support from local and international bodies, IOM has prepositioned non-food items including tents and blankets.

ZEF's Shumba said inadequate publicity about the regularization process and lack of information on the requirements had deterred many Zimbabweans from applying.

Employers had also often been reluctant to provide letters of employment for fear of persecution. "The home affairs [department] assured these employers that there will be no action taken against them a bit too late," Shumba said.

"Most Zimbabwean migrants work part-time, it was difficult for them to establish full-time employment," Hanekom noted.

Nevertheless, Zimbabweans migrants could still apply for asylum, he said. "The application will provide them a temporary asylum seeker’s status until their interview to establish whether they qualify - this can take up to two years."
He noted that asylum applications by Zimbabweans had a dismal record, "95 percent of them get rejected, but it can still get you some time."

In the past 10 years, as hyperinflation, and social and economic problems have rocked Zimbabwe, more and more Zimbabweans have sought refuge in neighbouring South Africa, the most economically advanced country in the region.

- IRIN Africa