Johannesburg - Despite concerns that South Africa's amended visa regulations would cause a slump in tourism, the Department of Home Affairs recorded a 7.6 percent increase in foreign arrivals over the festive season.
Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba appeared triumphant at a media briefing on Tuesday, where he shared the country's latest travel statistics for the December 1, 2015 to January 7, 2016 period.
According to the figures, more than 5.3 million people travelled through the country's border posts - arrivals and departures. Of that number, over 3.9 million were foreigners while more than 1.4 million were citizens.
Total movement for December 1, 2013 to January 7, 2014 was 5 141 021, while the figure stood at 5 116 783 for December 1, 2014 to January 7, 2015.
Gigaba conceded there had been a "slight drop" in the previous year but said it was attributable to the introduction of the amended visa regulations at the time and that people had been "grappling" with the regulations.
The latest statistical period saw over 2.7 million foreigners travel into the country, a leap from the 2014/15 period, when over 1.8 million foreigners arrived.
"With regard to travelling minors, 284 191 foreign minors travelled to South Africa. Only 0.6 percent of foreign minors were turned back due to lack of compliance with requirements for travelling minors," Gigaba said.
He said while the focus was always on European travellers, year on year, the country experienced the highest number of arrivals from African countries.
"The top nationalities arriving in South Africa over this period were from Lesotho, Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Swaziland, Botswana, the UK, Germany, the US and Namibia," he added.
Topping the top 10 ports of entry and departure were OR Tambo International Airport, Beit Bridge, Lebombo, Maseru Bridge and Ficksburg.
Gigaba stated: "Our country can balance the national interests of security and child safety with tourism. We can be a safe and convenient country to travel to, and we believe the immigration concessions do exactly that. We should be ready soon to report on the strong advisory in respect of children from visa-exempt countries."
He thanked all travellers and citizens for their conduct over the period, in spite of challenges in some areas such as long queues. He also thanked immigration officials, who kept order at the ports.
The Star