SW Radio Africa news - The Independent Voice of Zimbabwe
As the international community marked World Refugee Day on Thursday, authorities in South Africa were being urged to end the suffering of thousands of foreigners facing abuse there.
This includes a number of Zimbabwean nationals who still risk dangerous border crossings and possible ill treatment at the hands of their Southern neighbours.
The most recent incident that has shocked refugee protection groups was a police bust of a kidnapping ring, accused of preying on foreigners crossing the borders into South Africa. The alleged kidnappers were arrested earlier this month after 29 Zimbabwean and Mozambican nationals were found locked in a house in Orange Farm, just outside Johannesburg.
One of the Zimbabwean victims, a young woman who was kidnapped at Beitbridge with her two month old child, has spoken out about her ordeal. She has described how she and the other victims were denied food and water and relentlessly beaten. The kidnappers also threatened to kill her child.
The incident has highlighted the desperate situation facing many foreigners in South Africa, left vulnerable by the country’s failing immigration policies. In recent months, the situation has continued to deteriorate and a growing number of cases of violence against foreigners have been reported.
This includes Wednesday night’s flare up of suspected xenophobic violence in a Cape Town neighborhood, which saw scores of foreign nationals being forced to flee their homes. The incident in Kraaifontein saw criminals looting an estimated 200 shops and spazas owned by refugees and immigrants living in the area.
Refugee rights groups PASSOP said this incident is not unique, “but rather has become a frequent occurrence and is in need of urgent intervention.” The group said it was ‘disheartened’ on World Refugee Day, because South Africa is still failing to uphold the rights of refugees.
Stella Mkiliwane, the chairperson of the Forced Migration Working Group in South Africa, said Thursday that the problem is multilayered, with the rights of refugees and asylum seekers being violated on a number of different levels. She said a ‘documentation crisis’ was the root cause of the problems, because a lack of documentation and the taboo facing foreigners with asylum seeker papers, “leaves so many people vulnerable.”
“They are facing anger by communities who accuse them of stealing jobs, corruption at home affairs, discrimination because of their papers. It is a multi-layered problem,” Mkiliwane told SW Radio Africa.
She added that the onus is on the government to implement proper education and integration strategies to end the cycle of abuse facing foreigner in the country, saying “proper dialogue is a first step that must be taken.”
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