ld hear people moving through the bush and it was
like the sound of a herd of cattle moving through the grass.” This was a
Zimbabwean refugee describing the movement of desperate people to
neighboring South Africa this week.
Experts say between two and three thousand people are crossing the
border every night, as a result of the price cuts crisis that began a couple
of weeks ago. Although the influx of Zimbabweans has been growing steadily
over the last few years, South Africa has seen a marked jump in recent
weeks.
In the past many of the people who fled the country were political
refugees but observers say now it’s almost entirely economic refugees. Hunger,
combined with years of difficulties, has finally pushed people over the
edge. Journalist Geoff Hill said: “Whereas people used to cross just by the
Beit Bridge area, people are now going across the entire length of the South
Africa border with Zimbabwe – which is almost 200km – and they are
using the whole river to come into South Africa.”
Hill added: “To show concern for that there was a huge South Africa
police conference in Messina today.”
South Africa Home Affairs officers and border police working the
Limpopo River district also told reporters on Thursday that the flow of
economic and political refugees crossing South Africa’s northern border has become
“a tsunami.”
Questions are now being raised as to whether or not South Africa has
the capacity to deal with the ever-increasing flood of refugees crossing
the Limpopo River. Crime is said to have also risen at Beit Bridge, a
situation that is now affecting the security and integrity of the border post.
Geoff Hill said: “But there is no sign of the government (SA) or SADC
breaking ranks or speaking out on Zimbabwe, despite this crisis every night
of 2000 to 3 000 people continues, across the Limpopo River.”
Meanwhile, most of the major supermarkets in Zimbabwe are empty,
causing serious food shortages. While long queues of people searching for food
and fuel have resurfaced, others prefer to cross the crocodile-infested
Limpopo River in search of food – and hope.- SW RAdio AFrica