Barry Streek
The government sees the free movement of people and workers among the 14 member states of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) as a medium-term goal, top government representative Joel Netshitenzhe confirmed this week.
This is in marked contrast with current policy, and follows a xenophobic riot in Zandspruit, near Johannes-burg, two weeks ago. The Department of Home Affairs spends about about R45-million a year deporting illegal immigrants, most of whom are from SADC countries.
Netshitenzhe was approached after Minister in the Office of the President Essop Pahad stressed the desirability of the free movement of people in the region in a speech in Parliament.
Pahad said: “We cannot, as South Africans, escape from the fact that, at some point in our lives, we will have to say we cannot have a free trade area without the free movement of labour in this region.
“We thus address the issues of our people in the region in a different way from just trade and capital movement. We talk about the reality of movement, free movement of labour and the free movement of people in our region.”
Institute for Democracy in South Africa migration specialist Vincent Williams said Pahad’s statement was at odds with the position of Minister of Home Affairs Mangosuthu Buthelezi and his department, and with the provisions of the proposed Immigration Bill. This aims to keep out illegal immigrants, including those from Southern Africa.
“If Pahad is arguing that we must move to freedom of movement it is a significant step. This is precisely the leadership that is required at a political level.”
If Pahad’s views reflected those of the presidency, Parliament’s home affairs committee should have taken that into account when it considered the Immigration Bill. The presidency should encourage the home affairs department and Buthelezi to move in the direction of free movement, Williams said.
Williams and Buthelezi’s special adviser, Mario Ambrosini, pointed out that a draft regional protocol calling for the free movement of people was rejected by South Africa in 1997.
The original intention was for SADC to be modelled on the European Union where free population movement includes the right to reside in member countries.
Ambrosini said South Africa still needed to develop policy in this area, as it had been on hold for years. “It is a political decision and home affairs is at the running end of policy it does not formulate policy,” Ambrosini said.