RUSTENBURG - The process of documenting thousands of Zimbabweans who have applied for work, business and study permits will be allowed to run its full course before South Africa resumes the deportation of illegal foreign immigrants, Home Affairs minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma has said.
The announcement has allayed fears among scores of Zimbabweans who are still waiting for the Home Affairs to process their permits. Initially – when the documentation process started on September 1 last year – Zimbabweans living in South Africa were informed that they would face deportation from 1 January 2011 if they failed to regularize their stay in the country.
However a number of factors, among them the slow rate at which the Zimbabwean government was issuing passports, slowed down the documentation process – which was supposed to have been completed before December 31 last year. “We are not deporting anyone until we finish with our backlog of office work,” said Dlamini-Zuma, during a visit to the Bojanala Home Affairs regional offices in Rustenburg.
“Staffers have in some cases been working double shifts, until 10pm in the night and this will continue for the next month or so,” she added.
Home Affairs officials who spoke to The Zimbabwean said they were working at a rate of 1000 applications each week. However the Home Affairs minister could not say when the documentation process would be completed. “We are not in a position to say when the process will be completed but we are working flat out to make sure that we do not take a lot of time clearing the backlog,” said Dlamini-Zuma.
Post published in: News