Zim passport threat dismissed by SA refugee rights group

The Cape Town based PASSOP group said on Wednesday that a deadline announced by the consulate for the collection of passports was no reason to panic. PASSOPs Braam Hanekom explained that a notice was placed on the consulates website, saying all passports must be collected from Johannesburg by Friday, regardless of where in South Africa applications were made for the documents. That noticed has since been removed.

Hanekom told SW Radio Africa that traveling to Johannesburg to collect passports was out of the question for most Zimbabweans in Cape Town and other cities. The documents cost more than R700, a princely sum for the many Zimbabweans scraping together a basic living in South Africa. Hanekom said the additionally prohibitive cost of travel means that the Zim authorities have an obligation to deliver the passports to where the applications were originally made.

Hanekom said the Zimbabwean Consulate appears to be trying to manipulate both the South African government and to intimidate Zimbabwean citizens.

The Zim government has been manipulating the authorities in South Africa using the Zimbabwean passport applicants as leverage for their own political means, Hanekom said. This suspected manipulation is related to the Zim governments ongoing failure to produce enough passports for the thousands of Zimbabweans who have applied to regularise their stay in South Africa. The passports are necessary to finalise the permit applications, which the South African authorities are trying to do before August. But a deadline for the Zim authorities to produce the documents has been extended twice, and only a token effort appears to have been made to get passports rolled out.

South Africa has also extended its moratorium on Zimbabwean deportations until August, in an effort to make sure that all the permit applications are processed. But it is widely believe that officials within the Zim government are deliberately trying to stall the delivery of passports, to ensure that citizens in the Diaspora cannot vote in upcoming elections. We remain highly suspicious that the problems surrounding the delivery of passports might be part of broader motivations by the Zimbabwean government to obstruct this documentation project, Hanekom said.

Meanwhile, some observers have commented that the Zim consulates efforts to frustrate the documentation process could also be related to the regions apparent change of stance towards the Zim crisis. South Africas Jacob Zuma has been blasted by the ZANU PF regime after he, together with other leaders in the region, harshly criticised the violence and political deadlock in Zimbabwe.

The criticisms came during a summit of the regional SADCs security organ in Zambia, where SADC leaders apparently had strong words for Robert Mugabe during closed door sessions. Mugabe left the Troika summit visibly angry and South Africas Zuma has since been accused of betrayal. Some commentators have said that the Zim authorities refusal to honour its commitments in South Africa is a reaction to the fallout with Mugabe.