South Africa’s immigration system needs an overhaul, says Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi.
His call follows a rise in tensions between locals and foreign nationals in several communities, with the main issue being unhappiness about undocumented immigrants taking up jobs and others being fingered for crimes.
Discussions on a number of policies, including immigration policy, are expected to take place during day two of the ANC’s sixth National Policy Conference being held at Nasrec.
Calling for an overhaul of South Africa’s immigration system, Motsoaledi said that in this regard he had presented a document via Albert Luthuli House on Monday this week for general councils in the Eastern Cape and Mpumalanga. Other branches had already received the document.
“What we are sharing in the document is that we need the overhaul of the whole immigration system in the country. We are seeing that from 1994, the ANC as a party never developed a policy on immigration,” said Motsoaledi.
He said recently-passed legislation had allowed government to establish a Border Management Authority, and this was done two weeks ago.
“Now all those Acts deal with immigration, but there is no over-arching policy that connects them together and says this is the policy direction. Now, this document is trying to develop that, but also picking up on issues that have been problematic for the past 28 years,” said Motsoaledi.
There is a high influx of Basotho and Zimbabwean nationals to South Africa seeking employment.
Some migrants who have entered South Africa have allegedly become involved in criminal activities.
Motsoaledi said every country has its own immigration laws, and South Africa was not planning to do anything outside of the law, but developing an appropriate response to what was happening in the country.