One of the committee members, Manuel Panzo, told GroundUp last
week that he had been trying to call the office but no one
answered his calls. He said his colleagues had also been trying
through emails.
In October 2009, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees
proposed to end refugee status for Angolans who fled the civil war
which ended in 2002. The South African government announced the
cessation of refugee status in 2013, but most of the former
refugees who wanted to stay were granted an Angolan Cessation
Permit (ACP) in an Angolan passport issued to them upon withdrawal
of their refugee status. These ACPs were valid for only two years.
In October 2015, the Scalabrini Centre submitted an application
for permanent residency on behalf of all ACP holders. After
several legal battles, the Department of Home Affairs eventually
agreed to grant the category of an `Angolan Special Permit`.
Angolan Special Permits were issued in 2018 and expire in 2021.The
conditions of the permit state that it cannot be extended, and its
conditions cannot be changed.
The former refugees had been placed in a precarious legal state
since 2013, Miranda Madikane, Director of The Scalabrini Centre,
said this week, with deep and damaging impacts on the community.
She told GroundUp, `Considering that Angolan former refugees
constitute a relatively small number of people, and considering
that they have a deep level of socio-economic integration in South
Africa, the ability to remain permanently within South Africa
would be an appropriate durable solution.`
Madikane said that it is in the interest of the South African
state to ensure that people living within its borders are
documented. `In our experience, the community of Angolan former
refugees and their families desperately want to seek durable
legality in

South Africa.`
In their letter to Home Affairs, the Angolan committee raised the
issue of uncertainty regarding their future when the permits
expire in 2021. They also asked the Department to provide a way
for children and spouses of Angolan former refugees to acquire
documents in South Africa. Some, who were not Angolan, had never
had documents though they were married to Angolan Special Permit
holders.
`Similarly, some children of ASP permit holders were too young or
unable to be documented in their parents` refugee status, and
could not access ASP permits,` the letter read.
The committee also asked the department to expand the Angolan
Special Permit programme to people with refugee or asylum seeker
status who had missed the deadlines, to legalise their stay in
South Africa. They explained that the problem is huge in small
cities such as Port Elizabeth.
Panzo said if the visas were not renewed it would harm many
families who had lived in South Africa for two decades and had
adult children born here who could not speak Portuguese. It would
also affect many people running businesses.
He said many people who had gone back to Angola after frustrations
with documentation had returned within two years. Though the
political system had improved and there was less persecution, life
there was `difficult`, he said. `Children born here will not
cope.`
GroundUp sent a query to Home Affairs on 26 September, and
followed up with another email on 30 September. On Tuesday
GroundUp called spokesperson Siyabulela Qoza who said he was not
aware of the query. He promised to check and respond. Home
Affairs` response will be added when it is received.
www.sami.co.za V.2974

I recently renewed my passport at Home Affairs in a bank branch and was very impressed with the service and quick turnaround time. The Department of Home Affairs (DHA) and major banks first launched the option to do Smart ID card and passport applications via select bank branches in 2016. It has slowly grown to around 30 locations, including branches from Absa, Discovery Bank, FNB, Investec, Nedbank, and Standard Bank. My passport was set to expire in October 2024, and because many countries require that your passport be valid for six months from a travel date, a renewal was due. V.5324
Click here for full article

DA MP says this is up 20 000 from the 74 000 six months previously Department of Home Affairs visa backlog is up by 20 000 in 6 months The Democratic Alliance (DA) can reveal that the Department of Home Affairs (DHA) Visa backlog has increased from 74 000 in August 2023 to 92 000 as of 16 February 2024. This is an increase of just under 20 000 in about 6 months. Download the Parliamentary question and answer here. The increase goes against what the Minister told the Home Affairs Parliamentary Committee in March 2023. V.5325
Click here for full article

The European Union (EU) will limit visas for people from Ethiopia. This is because the Ethiopian government hasn`t been helping take back citizens who stay in the EU illegally. The EU Council announced this in a statement on Monday. Ethiopians won`t get visas for multiple entries anymore. Also, Ethiopians with diplomatic and service passports won`t have their visa fees waived. V.5326
Click here for full article

CRIMINAL convictions more than two decades ago came to haunt a man who was offered a job as a senior data discovery and enrichment expert, but after his prospective employer got wind of the convictions, retracted the job offer. But the Gqeberha Labour Court came to his rescue and found that the man should be given a second chance, given that his convictions occurred 20 years ago and had meanwhile been expunged. V.5327
Click here for full article

Nigeria’s economy, which ranked as Africa’s largest in 2022, is set to slip to fourth place this year and Egypt, which held the top position in 2023, is projected to fall to second behind South Africa after a series of currency devaluations, International Monetary Fund forecasts show. The IMF’s World Economic Outlook estimates Nigeria’s gross domestic product at $253 billion based on current prices this year, lagging energy-rich Algeria at $267 billion, Egypt at $348 billion and South Africa at $373 billion. V.5328
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article