Cape Town - Two hundred rand and a scribbled code on your hand will get you to the front of the queue at the Department of Home Affairs’ refugee centre at Customs House in Cape Town, refugees queueing outside the centre said on Tuesday.
Customs House is the only Western Cape location where refugees and asylum seekers can extend their permits, lodge appeals or submit supporting documents to the department.
Refugees the Cape Times interviewed on Tuesday alleged corruption was rife at the centre. Adees Sid, 32, from Pakistan, said he had come to the centre to renew his asylum seekers permit, as it expired on Tuesday.
Sid said many refugees were approached by what he called “free agents”, who worked with security guards at the centre to let someone jump the queue.
For the favour they charged R200 to R500, he said.
Sid, who repairs cellphones and laptops for a living, said he had arrived at the centre at 7am, but by 11am the queue had only moved a couple of metres. He said people constantly tried to push into the queue. The handful of security guards then had to push and shove refugees back in an attempt to restore order.
Sid said in this “chaos” people sneak into the queue, lose things or even have their possessions stolen.
One refugee showed the Cape Times a code on his hand which he said was a mark indicating that he had paid an “agent”. He said he had been let into the centre after paying R200, but when some other refugees began throwing stones outside, he was forced out again.
His story could not be verified, but many other refugees independently said the process worked by bribing “agents”.
Some said they had lost money to agents who hadn’t delivered. A Bangladeshi in his 30s, who didn’t want to be named, said he paid R500 to what appeared to be a genuine agent on Monday morning, but the man disappeared with his money.
Officials at the centre directed all queries to Yusuf Simons, the department’s provincial head.
Neither Simons nor Martha Mxgashe, who had been acting provincial head while Simons was on leave, could be reached.
E-mails to national Home Affairs spokesman Ronnie Mamoepa and Deputy Director- General of Immigration Services Jacky Mckay also went unanswered.
The refugee centre had to close early on Tuesday afternoon after confrontations between angry refugees – some of whom threw rocks at the building – and security guards and police, who used pepper spray to push the crowd back.
Security personnel closed the centre after stones were thrown at them. Most of the refugees left, but a small group stayed at the doorway, trying to get more information. Police later used pepper spray to force them back.
Meanwhile, refugee rights group People Against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty (Passop) said preliminary findings from its Customs House refugee “monitoring project” had pointed to a lack of staff, “bad queue management” and cases of corruption as contributing to problems at the centre. Passop started a project monitoring how refugees were treated at the Foreshore building last week.
Passop’s community outreach officer, Anthony Muteti, said the group was in its second week of a three-week investigation. “Our main objective is to give the relevant authorities… information on how the process can be improved.”
Last month, the Department of Home Affairs said the head of security at Customs House had been removed for allegedly taking bribes, and was being investigated.
Cape Times