Zuma disliked courts and mistrusted the law. In 2005, Zuma was
fired by President Mbeki as a consequence of a High Court having
found a conspiracy of politicos guilty of corruption for
unlawfully paying Zuma large sums of money. At a time when Zuma
faced more than 700 counts of bribery, corruption and fraud, he
decided, in the spirit of the ANC’s manifesto of “Submit or Fight”
that he would ascend to the apex of political power, and would
disarm the criminal justice system and the judiciary against him.
It came as no surprise that Zuma’s first order of business was to
disempower the prosecutorial authority, denigrate the judiciary
and empower the bureaucracy, including the Department of Home
Affairs (DHA). This had the immediate effect of destabilising the
immigration administrative process. The closing of our borders by
a renegade DHA became the reality of foreigners and immigration
lawyers alike. As Ray Hartley wrote in the Independent in 2016:
One of Zuma’s first acts [as president in 2009] was to re-organise
SA’s intelligence structures into one department, which was to
fall under the control of a new intelligence minister, Siyabonga
Cwele.
A few days before Zuma became president on 9 May 2009, he publicly
declared that he wanted to review the status of the Constitutional
Court:
If I sit here and I look at a chief justice of the Constitutional
Court, you know, that is the ultimate authority, which I think we
need to look at, because I don’t think we should have people who
are almost like God in a democracy
... Why are they not human beings? I don’t want to debate that
now, but at the right time I’m keen to engage them before the
issue becomes public.
Because ... you can have a judge of whatever level making a
judgment (and) other judges turning it and saying it was wrong.
(This) just tells you they are not necessarily close to God. And
therefore we have to look at it in a democratic setting; how do
you avoid that?
Fundamental to Zuma’s state capture project was the depreciation
of the rule of law and the legal profession. Zuma’s deep contempt
for the judiciary reached its zenith with the government’s refusal
to arrest the Sudanese president Omar al-Bashir, who visited South
Africa in 2015 and was subject to an arrest warrant issued by the
International Criminal Court. As journalist Moshoeshoe Monare put
it:
ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe’s deep-seated antagonism
towards the judiciary stems partly from his archaic view of the
world, but also from sheer ignorance. After the Pretoria high
court ordered the government to arrest Sudan’s President Omar al-
Bashir, Mantashe said the Pretoria and Cape Town high courts have
a negative attitude toward the government ... Mantashe’s dangerous
paranoia makes him believe that anyone who disagrees with the
ruling party wants it out of power. He believes the party is
supreme and its power unquestionable ... Like the South African
Communist Party (SACP), which he once chaired, Mantashe doesn’t
see government as the temporary bearer of state authority; for
them, winning elections means capturing state power and all its
levers �` including the judiciary ... They believe any talk of
constitutionalism is liberal claptrap and a conspiratorial plot to
frustrate the revolution. For them democracy means that the
winning party is the principal political actor, eclipsing society
and commandeering the state ... The rule of law, according to
Mantashe, is a pretentious tool utilised by the judiciary to
subvert democracy. Judges, journalists, civil society groups, or
anyone who scrutinises and questions the exercise of power is the
enemy of the revolution, a closet member of the opposition or part
of the liberal conspiracy ... But Zuma and Mantashe are motivated
by their desire to cripple the judiciary’s independence and
bolster the exutive’s power. Zuma said: ‘The executive must be
allowed to conduct its administration and policymaking work as
freely as it possibly can. The powers conferred on the courts
cannot be superior to the powers resulting from the political and
consequently administrative mandate resulting from popular
democratic elections.’
Since at least 2009, South Africa’s immigration system began
operating under the aegis of Zuma’s ex-wife, home affairs minister
Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma, as a locus of independent power within the
constellation of government departments.
The first phase of the capture of South Africa’s borders and its
immigration system began with Dlamini-Zuma’s deployment of cadres
as enforcers of a restrictive immigration policy narrative. In
2010, with the centralisation of decision-making on all
immigration and citizenship applications, a new approach to
immigration control was predicated on the fabricated scourge of
human trafficking. This phase morphed into legislation with the
enactment of stringent immigration legislation in 2014,
effectively closing our borders to foreigners.
The patterns of gross inefficiency and maladministration in the
DHA’s handling of citizenship and immigration applications are
inextricable from the “designed chaos” that has been widely
observed in the country. Compliant applications have frequently
been rejected; appeals and ministerial exemption applications have
been stymied by red tape, to the extent that corruption often
seemed the only remedy for those desperate enough. Secretary-
general of the South African Council of Churches, Bishop Malusi
Mpumlwana �` in his report on the May 2017 Unburdening Panel
hearings �` cautioned that what appears to be chaos and instability
in government “may well be a systemic design of the madness that
ills our political environment �` a chaotic design”. Likewise,
investigative journalist Richard Poplak observes:
The political sewerage never stops flowing long enough for us to
grasp complexity, a situation that should never be confused with
commonplace chaos. The mess has been carefully curated: the
intention is to disassemble the administrative state, and replace
it with a perfectly calibrated extraction machine.
The system of immigration administration in South Africa based
itself on a dangerous duality of standards of administrative
justice, while the DHA complex of bureaucrats and cabinet
ministers remained firmly entrenched. This complex artificially
manipulated policies, procedures and access to efficient decision-
making for purposes other than preserving the integrity of the
legislative apparatus. The closure of the borders to everyone
created an opportunity to modulate their opening to those willing
to pay a higher price.
One such example is the politically preferential treatment granted
to a senior member of the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine, Leila Khaled, who was invited to South Africa in
February 2015 by the anti-Israel Boycott Divestment and Sanctions
campaign to participate in a roadshow. Khaled is clearly a
“prohibited” person in terms of our immigration legislation: she
belongs to an organisation that furthers its objectives through
crime, including the hijacking of planes.
Malusi Gigaba, at that time home affairs minister, went to the
airport as part of her welcoming committee. The only way that
Khaled could have lawfully entered South Africa was for her
prohibition to be lifted by the director-general with “good
cause”. By all accounts, this was not done, and her entry was
facilitated by the DHA complex without any public explanation.
Gigaba’s role in facilitating Khaled’s entry outside the scope of
the normal legislative constraints cannot be gainsaid.
In June 2015 al-Bashir escaped an international arrest warrant by
departing the country through Waterkloof Airforce Base with the
full knowledge of DHA director-general Mkuseli Apleni and Gigaba.
Apleni conceded in court papers that, among the batch of passports
belonging to

the delegation that left Waterkloof, al-Bashir’s was
not examined by immigration officers. This is an indisputable case
of political rent-seeking at the behest of the executive
authority, with the full cooperation of a willing complex of
officials.
This complex was supported by rank-and-file officials planted in
positions of influence and practical usefulness. Gideon
Christians, first secretary of consular affairs in New Delhi �`
where most of the Gupta-related visas applications were received �`
recently had charges of corruption and fraud laid against him by
the non-profit Organisation Undoing Tax Abuse, which aims to
challenge corruption.
Evidence now in the public domain includes emails showing that a
senior Gupta associate asked a second DHA operative, Major Kobese
�` the coordinator of foreign consular missions at the DHA’s head
office in Pretoria �` and other officials to exercise lenience in
processing and expediting visas for the benefit of Gupta
businesses or family members. Christians’ deployment to New Delhi
was, in Kobese’s words, “outside the normal recruitment process”.
While Christians and Kobese remain untouchables within the DHA,
Zuma and Gigaba were forced to resign in February and November
2018 respectively. Cyril Ramaphosa immediately assumed the
presidency. Ramaphosa �` a lawyer, billionaire and labour union
leader �` was Nelson Mandela’s first choice for President.
Ramaphosa inherited a momentum of immigration reform from his
predecessors in the form of a White Paper on International
Migration. But Ramaphosa’s appointment of previous state security
minister Siyabonga Cwele as Gigaba’s replacement creates a
disturbing chill on a post-Zuma immigration regime.
The White Paper was approved by the Zuma cabinet in March 2017 and
purports to provide a policy framework that “will guide the
comprehensive review of immigration and related legislation” in
South Africa, and will result in draft amended legislation in
March 2019. The White Paper rejects South Africa’s existing
immigration management system because it fails to adequately
protect South Africa in terms of international best practices (a
holistic, risk-based compliance management system). This is a
disappointing endeavour as the ruling ANC has, since 2004, enjoyed
unfettered control of immigration policy in South Africa. The
White Paper refrains from posing the obvious question: why has
Home Affairs not been able to transform itself in the past 15
years into the type of organisation the White Paper purports to
describe?
One of the principal links between government and civil society is
the role of lawyers representing foreigners seeking entry and
immigration status in South Africa. The White Paper identifies
legal practitioners and the court process in abusing systemic
loopholes at the expense of government, and in the driving-forward
of policy. Lawyers holding powers of attorney from their clients
are often disregarded and maligned by DHA officials processing
applications, especially in foreign South African missions. There
is little doubt that the Zuma-era antipathy towards legal
representation and the judicial process finds its place within
South Africa’s immigration bureaucracy.
The White Paper fundamentally misconceives the role of lawyers as
the collective representation of civil society, and the litigation
process, in the shaping of immigration policy. The White Paper
fails to acknowledge that the litigation process ensues only when
the possibility of negotiating workable solutions with the DHA has
failed. In order to achieve a comprehensive approach to border
management, which includes the coherence of both government and
civil society representation, the attitude of DHA officials must
be purged and transformed into a constitutionally sensitive
disposition towards human rights and service delivery.
The White Paper proposes that permanent residence and citizenship
be “de-linked”. It argues:
In South Africa controls are weakened because there is currently a
linkage between certain temporary residence visas ... and
permanent residence permits ... which, provided certain conditions
are met, effectively creates automatic qualification for
[permanent residence permits] and subsequently for citizenship.
Thus one of the main criteria used to qualify for permanent
residence is the period of stay in the country, irrespective of
the type of temporary residence visa initially issued, or purpose
of entry.
It concludes by stating:
There is a misconception that immigrants have a constitutional
right to progress towards permanent residency or citizenship
status ... The current approach does not allow the granting of
residency or naturalization to be used strategically.
The White Paper seeks to replace permanent residence permits with
temporary residence visas in order to dispel a misconception that
immigrants have a constitutional right to progress towards
citizenship status on the basis of a number of years spent in the
country.
This is an irrational approach. There exists no such misconception
at all. Cogent policy re-formulation cannot be based on a bid “to
dispel a misconception”. There is a legislative framework in place
that allows a foreigner in possession of permanent residence
status to apply for citizenship by naturalisation, after
demonstrating ordinary residence in South Africa for a minimum of
five years. In order to achieve citizenship on this basis, a
bureaucratic process is concluded by which the underlying
permanent residence permit is verified to assess its bona fides;
police checks are completed; and compliance with the legislative
scheme is ensured. De-linking residency and citizenship can easily
be accomplished by amending section 5 of the South African
Citizenship Act in a way that de-emphasises or removes any link
between the period of ordinary residence in South Africa and an
expectation of citizenship. Re-formulating immigration policy to
achieve this end is overkill by any standard and a dangerous
pretext for tightening border control even more.
The need for a new international migration policy in South Africa,
and the production of the White Paper, together constitute nothing
more than a concession that South Africa’s endeavour to
constructively, compliantly and effectively manage international
migration since 1994 has been an unmitigated failure. The very
same individuals �` at least since 2004 �` responsible for the
inadequacies highlighted by the White Paper are its current
authors. The White Paper does not reveal its sources or its true
authors, so we may legitimately rely on the assumption that DHA
management, including the complex of officials involved with Zuma-
era state capture, are responsible for the analysis and
conclusions drawn in the White Paper. The White Paper concedes
their guilt that, with all their resources available during the
past 14 years, they were unable to adopt international best
practices codified by the World Bank almost a decade ago.
Ramaphosa’s cabinet should keep the White Paper in abeyance until
such time as South African policymakers have conducted the
necessary research and analysis, and are able to arrive at their
conclusions, in a rational empirical manner after national
elections. V.2827

There are fears that more people will be separated by the introduction of a minimum salary level for those wanting UK family visas. Families living in the UK and abroad have raised concerns about what new rules will mean for them as they try to reunite with foreign spouses. In December, the Home Office, which says migration to the UK is too high, announced a package of measures to reduce net migration, following a spike in arrival numbers. V.5318
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An Ethiopian asylum seeker, who does not speak English, claims he was duped by a senior immigration official into paying an admission of guilt fine when he thought he was paying for bail.Two Western Cape High Court judges have condemned the official`s `deplorable` behaviour, set aside the fine, and ordered the immigration official be taken off the case. Tsegaye Esyas claims Annelise van Dyk treated him like an animal which led to him attempt suicide while in police cells. V.5320
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EREMY MAGGS: I want to stay with crime now. Individuals with a criminal record may be faced with significant challenges when seeking employment, I think that’s a given. Here in South Africa, employers may legally exclude an applicant from consideration for a position if having a clean criminal record is what is termed an inherent requirement of the job. That phrase, inherent requirement, is important, but what exactly does that mean, and when can an applicant be lawfully excluded for having a criminal record? V.5321
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As a South African who has adopted a nomadic work lifestyle alongside my wife, Ingrid Lotze, I’ve been an interested observer of South Africa’s snail-pace digital nomad visa (DNV) development process. Despite the optimism surrounding its introduction, the visa seems to miss several crucial marks for digital nomads like us. V.5322
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DA MP says hours lost continue to result in persons being unable to collect their ID documents due to unmanageable queues The DA has been inundated with complaints that the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) systems are offline, resulting in long queues and delayed processing of documents. Through questions posed to the Minister, the DA can now reveal that the DHA has lost over 77 years’ worth of working hours due to system downtime and load-shedding from 2019 to date. Concerningly, this data only relates to hours lost for the application of smart IDs, meaning decades more of working hours could have been additionally lost in other spheres such as passport or visa applications. V.5314
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Home Affairs’ seemingly endless court battles set the department back more than R110-million between April 2023 and the end of February this year. This was revealed in a written parliamentary response by minister Aaron Motsoaledi. He said the department accumulated a litigation bill of R117 692 996.3, higher than the R72 637 944.51 spent the year before. V.5315
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Airports Company South Africa (ACSA) this week revealed that Cape Town International Airport (CTIA) has achieved a ground-breaking milestone by processing more than 10 million passengers over a single financial year. This is the highest number of regional and international passengers processed since COVID-19 V.5316
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In recent years, South Africa has seen a significant influx of immigrants from various African countries, as well as other parts of the world. This has raised important questions about the country`s immigration policies and their impact on job creation for both locals and immigrants. The South African immigration system, like many other countries, is a complex and ever-evolving process that aims to balance the country`s economic needs with its social and cultural interests. Let`s take a closer look at how this system intersects with job creation in South Africa. The South African government implemented the Immigration Act of 2002, which outlines the country`s immigration policies and procedures. Under this act, foreigners are required to obtain a visa or permit to enter, work, or study in South Africa. The type of visa or permit required depends on the intended purpose of the individual`s visit and their country of origin. V.5312
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Due to system downtime and load-shedding, the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) lost nearly 141,000 hours of Smart ID application and production time between the 2019/20 and 2022/23 financial years. Minister Aaron Motsoaledi revealed this figure in a recent response to questions raised in Parliament by Democratic Alliance MP Adrian Roos. Motsoaledi provided a breakdown of smart ID production and application hours lost to technical difficulties and load-shedding per province for each financial year from 2019/2020. These disruptions hit home Affairs offices in the Eastern Cape the hardest, with over 34,000 hours to rotational power cuts and system downtime. Mpumalanga offices lost the next-highest number of hours at 17 V.5313
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Home Affairs Minister Dr Aaron Motsoaledi has said the public has shown great support for the final White Paper on citizenship, immigration and refugee protection which appeared in the Government Gazette on Wednesday. Briefing the media, he addressed what he saw as a long-overdue need to replace an outdated Citizenship Act, as well as enact proposed changes to existing legislation. V.5306
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