The High Court in Johannesburg has interdicted the Home Affairs Department from deporting th November 2023e mother (“TRS”), who is illegally in South Africa after her spousal visa from a previous marriage expired .
A mother’s bid to permanently relocate to Israel with her two children, with whom she shares joint custody with their father, has been put on hold while a court battle ensues around her looming deportation.
The High Court in Johannesburg has interdicted the Home Affairs Department from deporting the mother (“TRS”), who is illegally in South Africa after her spousal visa from a previous marriage expired .
High Court Judge Stuart Wilson had to interdict her deportation by the department after she was expected to report to its offices on Monday.
According to the judgment, the mother, after her spousal visa expired “unwisely obtained a fraudulent permit on which she relied for some time to remain in the country”.
“She was eventually found out, charged, convicted and is now subject to deportation as an illegal foreigner.
There is no suggestion that the third respondent, the minister, is inclined to revisit TRS’s status as an illegal foreigner, and I must accept, for present purposes, that she is liable to deportation at any time. It appears that the minister has agreed to stay his hand until October 30 (yesterday), but there is no guarantee that TRS will be allowed to remain in South Africa beyond that date,” said Judge Wilson.
The judge said the looming deportation of the mother, who intended to take her two boys with her while having joint custody of them with their father who opposes having them go with her, “is obviously a highly unsatisfactory situation”.
The mother, who holds Israeli and US passports, said she intended to return to Israel where she had “loving and supportive extended family” after experiencing an “emotionally volatile

time” in South Africa.
The father, however, opposes her application to permanently relocate, preferring that all three of them remain in the country, but if her application was granted that the children remain.
“The question of whether (the mother) should be permitted to relocate to Israel with the children seems to me to be one of real complexity. As things stand, both she and (the father) play equally important roles in their children’s lives,” said Judge Wilson.
“I have no doubt that each of them has developed a close and loving bond with the children. Whatever happens in this case, the children are likely to suffer some detriment. If the mother leaves with the children, they will lose the closeness of a loving father. If she leaves without the children, they will be separated from their mother.
“At the tender ages of 1 and 3, either of these outcomes could be devastating for them. But just as potentially undesirable is a situation in which the mother remains precariously in South Africa to be with the children, with all the stress that would cause her, and which would likely be transmitted in some way to the children.
“Another possible outcome is that she is given leave by the minister to remain in South Africa permanently, but that she never really settled here, and is left in a state of anguish and resentment as a result. That, too, will clearly affect the children and their well-being,” said the judge.
While litigation in the matter continues, he said as the interdict was interim in nature, it “remained open to the minister or to the fourth respondent, the director-general, to apply to court for appropriate relief in the event that new circumstances arise which justify the interdict’s variation or discharge” V.5062

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

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article

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
Click here for full article