Over 200 refugees and asylum seekers will appear in the Krugersdorp District Court on Wednesday to face charges under the Road Traffic Act after they slept on the side of the road for a week.
A police barricade was in place outside the court.
Those arrested allegedly hindered and obstructed traffic on a public road, said police spokesperson Superintendent Lungelo Dlamini.
The group lived on the verge of the R28 between Krugersdorp and Randfontein for a week after being transferred from a shelter for xenophobia victims in Glenanda, Johannesburg, to the Lindela detention
centre in Krugersdorp.
They had refused to register at the Glenanda camp, fearing that the temporary identity cards they would be given would cancel their existing immigration rights.
As a result they were taken to Lindela, a facility which detains foreigners believed to be in the country illegally.
But officials discovered the refugees were in the country legally and released them to return to their South African homes.
The Department of Home Affairs had validated the documents that allowed them residence in South Africa and said the refugees were now ”on their own”.
The immigrants stayed on the side of the road, saying they were too scared to return to their communities and would rather be repatriated.
They were given until Monday to leave the roadside. On Monday afternoon the women and men were rounded up by police. Women refugees were taken to a place of safety and the men were arrested.
A wave of xenophobic attacks started in Alexandra township on May 12 and then spread around the country, leaving more than 62 people dead and an estimated 17 000 displaced, according to police. – Sapa