Minister Motsoaledi gets tough on work permits
Opera Newss - 21/01/2022
Home Affairs minister Aaron Motsoaledi is leaving no stones unturned in his quest for rooting out corruption.
Vukani Kusile Foundation’s Solly Masilela said: “It will take time for the clean-up to be a success because corruption and maladministration of the immigration laws and regulations is too entrenched and linked to other departments, such as the department of international relations and cooperation. It is a step in the right direction though.”
Masilela added that the SA immigration system had taken such a knock that SA-issued documents were not worth the paper they were printed on.
Motsoaledi has received the report of the task team up in March to review some permits in a raft of categories. These include permanent residence permits and citizenship by naturalisation issued since 2004.
His office said he would make an announcement soon.
The need to review the permits was triggered by a trend emerging from the outcomes of cases involving high-profile people investigated by the department’s corruption unit. In February the minister revealed that Enlightened Christian Gathering leader Shepherd Bushiri and his wife, Mary, had been in South Africa illegally.
The unit has established that 66% of cases involved immigration permitting.
Motsoaledi has said that in November last year, during a top-level investigation, he was shocked when 14 members of the permitting section signed a petition demanding that the corruption unit stop investigating their errors.
The minister said this admission strengthened his resolve to have a more transparent permit issuing regime.
Other permits on Motsoaledi’s radar are corporate visas, business visas, professional/critical skills visas, retired person’s visas and study visas.
Last week home, a home affairs official, Democratic Republic of the Congo national Mbemba Pierre Mahinga, was dealt a blow when the Supreme Court of Appeal dismissed his application to stop the department stripping him of his SA citizenship