The government needs to review its immigration policy, including possibly rewriting the Immigration Act, says Minister of Home Affairs Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula.
”There will be a need in the long term for government to look at a more holistic review of our immigration policy,” she told Parliament’s home affairs portfolio committee on Monday.
Such a review would possibly result in a rewrite of the Immigration Act ”as proposed by state law advisers”, Mapisa-Nqakula said, speaking at the start of a briefing by officials from her department on the Immigration Amendment Bill.
The draft legislation seeks to amend the Immigration Act of 2002, which was hurriedly passed through Parliament by Mapisa-Nqakula’s predecessor, Mangosuthu Buthelezi.
Earlier this year, President Thabo Mbeki said the amendment Bill should be finalised by the end of August.
Mapisa-Nqakula said it is important that South Africa develops long-term policies to ”effectively facilitate” the movement of people in and out of the country.
Committee chairperson Patrick Chauke said the start of any review of the existing Act ”will depend on the minister”.
”The global competitiveness of our immigration policy makes it quite difficult for us to attract foreign skill [and] foreign investment.
”To come into the country, you must go through a number of processes,” he said.
Chauke said the committee will hold public hearings later this week — on Wednesday and Thursday — on the Immigration Amendment Bill.
Business Unity South Africa, the Law Society of Northern Provinces and the Congress of South African Trade Unions are some of the bodies expected to make submissions.
Others are auditing firm PriceWaterhouseCoopers, the Association of Immigration Practitioners and the Western Cape Immigration Practitioners’ Forum. — Sapa