Illegals flock to home affairs

Source: Lowvelder, 13/04/2018

In South Africa, all roads lead to Mpumalanga for illegal immigrants.
The Lowveld in particular has become the hot spot where mainly
Pakistanis, Bangladeshis and Somalis find their way to the local home
affairs department to acquire illegal identification documents and
South African passports.
According to law enforcers and intelligence sources, the well-
established Pakistani underground networks of the terrorist
organisation Sipah-e-Sahaba, a radical body regarded in Pakistan as a
Sunni supremacist group at war with the minority Shia Muslim grouping
in the country, facilitates the safe passage for new arrivals in South
Africa.
“It is an extremely well-oiled network,” Lowvelder was told. “From the
facilitators assisting all the new arrivals, to the network of lawyers
on call 24 hours when arrests take place, to the ‘right’ state
prosecutors to ‘handle’ such cases.”

On arrival they are picked up and taken to safe houses in Mbombela or
Komatipoort, Lowvelder was told. There are also safe houses in Naas, on
the road between Komatipoort and the Swaziland border.
A well-placed source described how the Managa road becomes a beehive of
activity between 17:30 to 19:30 as taxis and other means of transport
do business with illegal immigrants where they wait in the bushes for
the scheduled pick-up of new border crossers to the safe houses in
Naas. He added that many of them are former Somali soldiers.
The identities of two local Pakistanis who act as the go-between for
the migrants and corrupt immigration officials, are known to the
newspaper. In Mbombela the “facilitator” operates from the Nedbank
Centre and in Komatipoort near the Total Garage.

The identities of the immigration officials are also known. One of them
has been on holiday overseas on more than occasion.
It is believed that since a corrupt network of home affairs officials
was exposed a few years ago, the focus turned to Mpumalanga as a safe
haven to buy illegal documents.
Lowvelder approached Doris Chiloane, home affairs spokesman for comment
on the allegations. None were forthcoming at the time of going to press.