Cape Town - A crackdown on companies employing more than 40% foreign labour is being vigorously pursued by the new minister of Home Affairs.
Home Affairs inspectors have begun a “mass inspection” of businesses countrywide.
Minister Hlengiwe Mkhize said on Wednesday her department’s inspectorate unit was continuing with inspections “at various places of employment to ensure compliance to this requirement, in terms of the Immigration Act”.
Homes Affairs had partnered with the SA Police Service as well as the Labour Department, she said.
“This is not a one off, but an ongoing activity which is achieved through inspections to ensure companies comply,” Mkhize said. “The role of the department is to continuously enforce compliance and there’s no limit on the number of times a place of employment can be inspected.”
The minister said in the past two months, “a total of 85 places of employment were visited”. These, she said, included chain stores, farms, hotels and other businesses.
The former Home Affairs Minster Malusi Gigaba had previously said the inspections were being carried out to prioritise the employment of South Africans and had “nothing to do with xenophobia”.
“In fact, xenophobic violence is what we want to prevent,” Gigaba said. “The risk of not employing South Africans is that it endangers the lives of foreigners and the property of companies. If you look at the (xenophobic) violence that erupted in 2015, it started precisely because of a company at Isiphingo in Durban that employed non-South Africans, and South Africans attacked the company.”
Home Affairs said the regulation - which had the support of trade union federation Cosatu - was not new, but had been tightened to flush out companies flouting the law.
Non-compliant companies will be fined heavily and have their licences reviewed, while managers and owners could be jailed for up to two years if the department decided to take legal action.
Cosatu spokesperson Sizwe Pamla said: “When you consider we have over nine million unemployed people, the 60% requirement is inadequate. The figure needs to be revised to 75%.”
National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) spokesperson Livhuwane Malivhoho said: “We have not yet taken a position on whether to support the legislation because we have a lot of members from our neighbouring countries who belong to our union, even our deputy president is from Botswana.”
Spokesperson for the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa) Phakamile Hlubi said the union could not comment at this stage.