Towards 2017 – how prepared are we as Zimbabweans in SA ?

Source: zimsinsa.com, 15/10/2016

IT`S just a year and half left before the Zimbabwe Special Permits
expire on 31st July 2017 and the conditions are clear.


The permits cannot be renewed and a ZSP holder cannot apply for a
Permanent Residence Permit notwithstanding the number of years one has
spent in South Africa.


Before we deal with what needs to be done, it`s important that we deal
with the historical background of the documentation project.


Historically, the people that used to come to South Africa are people
from Matabeleland though there were few Shona speaking who also
migrated to Mzansi to work and study.


Even the Zimbabwean first lady, Grace Mugabe stayed in Benoni up
until 1979 and we all know that she was born in SA in 1965.


Many ZIPRA cadres joined the Zimbabwe liberation struggle after been
inspired by the African National Congress and its military wing,
Umkonto Wesizwe (MK). They left their jobs in South Africa for Zambia.
In the 1970s , the apartheid regime recruited cheap labour from
Southern Rhodesia and in the rest of the Southern region. Those who
did not go back home, simply became "South Africans" by acquiring
citizenship.


After our independence in 1980, a number of ZAPU members who were
running away from Gukurahundi found themselves in South Africa and it
was easy for them to apply for South African IDs.


One would claim that, one was born in KwaZulu Natal. Because of the
similiarities in language (IsiNdebele and IsiZulu is the same) they
could in South African communities without any challenges.


This trend continued even after 1994; where the majority of people
from Matabeleland would simple apply for South African IDs, in most
cases adopting new names. For an example, Dumisani Sibanda who was
born in Tsholotsho , Zimbabwe, would apply for a South African ID and
be known as Bongani Zondi from Nongoma in KZN after perhaps bribing a
Home Affairs official. This was done mainly by those who could not
qualify to apply for work or business permits.


Then in 1995, the South African government granted an amnesty for
those from southern Africa who had fraudulent IDs and were granted
residency and subsequently citizenship.


Their new ID would clearly indicate that the person is South African
though born in Zimbabwe but some continued using the IDs that
identified them as South Africans by birth, even though one was born
in Zimbabwe.


The South African ID was the only legal document that those who did
not qualify for permits could lay their hands on. This trend continued
up to 2008. The issuing of authentic IDs acquired fraudulently was a
brisk business, lots of money exchanged hands at the Department of
Home Affairs.


When the Movement for Democratic Change was formed in 1999, it became
a threat to the ruling ZANU (PF). This forced the ruling party to
resort into state sponsored violence against members of the MDC and
civil society. Many of these political victims had to skip the border
to South Africa and to other countries. Upon arrival in South Africa,
these political victims could not be granted political asylum by the
South African government until May 2002. The argument raised by the
South African government at the time was that, there was no war in
Zimbabwe. Victims of political violence kept on coming to South
Africa.


It was then in May 2002 that myself and the then MDC Secretary
General, now MDC President Prof Welshman Ncube and then MDC Chairman
in South Africa, Jabulani Mkwanazi met with the then Director General
of Home Affairs Billy Masetla who agreed to grant victims of
political violence asylum.


Initially anyone applying for asylum had to pass through the MDC
office and we had MDC organising department registering political
victims. This process was overseen by the late Charles Ndebele and the
late Ben Mutasa who were in charge of our organising department.


The numbers of asylum seekers kept growing and the MDC office could no
longer handle the influx in our offices. We had to turn to the Home
Affairs dept to ask it to allow people to make applications directly
to the department.


This then meant that, Zimbabweans who were not necessarily political
victims but economic migrants, turned to seeking asylum as it allowed
them to work , study, run a business and more importantly, it offered
protection from deportation.


Many people applied for the asylum, including those who had South
African IDs.


According to the UN chapter on refugees, an asylum seeker or a holder
of an asylum document cannot go back to their country of origin until
what one had ran away from had been resolved. This would then mean
giving up asylum but a number of asyleess from Zimbabwe would go back
home, in clear violation of the asylum seekers rules and regulations.