Home Affairs wants David Foulds to go back to Britain, but the Trade and Industry Ministry believe he is an asset to the country, writes Marion Edmunds
AFTER an expensive and frustrating three-year struggle with officials, a British-born entrepreneur is taking Home Affairs Minister Mangosuthu Buthelezi to court to prevent Home Affairs from throwing him and his family out of South Africa.
David Foulds (41) served papers on Buthelezi, the Director General of Home Affairs Piet Colyn, and the mystery chairman of the department’s Immigration Board last week in the Johannesburg Supreme Court, appealing for permanent residence status which has repeatedly been refused him by the Department of Home Affairs.
Home Affairs rejected his permanent residence application on February 22, saying that their decision was final. This is despite the Trade and Industry Department’s support for Foulds’s application on the grounds that his specialist skills made him an asset to the country.
No reasons were given by Home Affairs for the rejection. Foulds was given first to the end of April, and after court papers were served on Home Affairs until the end of May to leave the country with his wife and five-year-old son, abandoning an efficient business and home to return to the United Kingdom where he has no substantial assets, no job and not much prospect of employment.
“It’s been soul-destroying,” said Foulds this week. “It’s been completely disruptive … I’ve been here for three years, having been told twice to pack up and go in three weeks. I never know one minute from the next if somebody is going to grab me in the street and deport me … Its been a constant concern.”
Foulds said the failure of Home Affairs to grant him a permanent residence permit meant that he had deliberately not sunk money into his own company, and that it had stifled its growth. Foulds runs a company which provides, fits and repairs electro magnetic retarders which are an essential feature in heavy vehicles to ensure that they can brake properly.
Foulds states in court papers that his current sales turnover is R256 000 a year and he believes his profits would double this year, and he could look forward to providing jobs for no less than 15 South Africans in the future.
Apart from positive affirmation from the Trade and Industry Department, Foulds has collected glowing references from such organisations as the Institute of Road Traffic Engineers and the South African Bus Operators Association. These seem to have had no impact on his case at all.
One may well ask why Foulds and family bother — why don’t they pack it in and try their luck elsewhere?
“Why should we throw in the towel?” retorted Foulds this week. “We love this country, we want to put down our roots, we could create jobs for South African nationals and we are not a burden on anybody.”