Life Partner Visa

Life Partner visa is issued to someone in a long term relationship.

This type of South Africa life partner visa is available to people in either heterosexual or same-sex relationships and can apply for a life partner temporary residence visa or a permanent residence depending on the length of the relationship in question.

An application for temporary residence life partner visa requires that the partners are in a proven relationship for 2 years. Foreigners who are life partners of South African citizens or permanent resident holders may apply for permanent residence if they have been together for 5 years or more in terms the Immigration Act.

To obtain permanent residence, you would have to have been living with your partner for more than 5 years. This came about with the new regulations.

The life partner visa is very similar to the spousal visa but accommodates same sex partnerships. You will have to prove financial and emotional support and may be called upon to be interviewed by the department.

SA Migration Intl will guide you through the entire process and make sure that your application is fully compliant with the immigration law to ensure a successful outcome. Once your application has been submitted we ensure you will be able to track the progress of said application either directly via VFS or via our followup processes via our application tracking system and be kept fully up to date with the progress of your application.

Once we confirm that you will qualify for the visa we will ensure you have a successful application.

Road to Nowhere — a day in a Hell Affairs queue

The Daily Maverick – 23 April 2022

South Africa has illusions of grandeur about being a modern, competitive country. A day or two or three in a queue at a Home Affairs office in Johannesburg should quickly (well, slowly) disabuse you of that notion. This is a story written while waiting in one of those lines.

inter is coming. The mornings are darker and colder. Nonetheless, by the time you arrive at Home Affairs at 7am, the queue is already a hundred people long. You can see on their faces that they are in for a long day. Grim determination.

Before the gates open at 8am, an official sends a Covid-19 form down the queue. Fill in your ID number, say whether you have any symptoms and so on. You know the drill. Unfortunately, it’s about the most efficient thing that will happen to you for the next six hours. Except that it’s completely unnecessary. Like Covid fogging. Even though Home Affairs is “run” by a doctor, they didn’t get the message or the prescription. 

Or maybe it’s because the department is run by a doctor. 

All the President’s Men: The deployees we should hold responsible for dysfunction and corruption in the Home Affairs Department. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

After that, there’s no communication, no numbering system (until you get through the door, which is many hours away). Just the hum of people quietly chatting.

Some people seem to get quicker access than others. Word passes back along the queue that “they have online bookings”. But you can’t make online bookings — it doesn’t work, says one of my new queue friends. 

“Most likely a backhander somewhere,” says another. 

After seven hours: Inside at last, inside at last, thank God Almighty we are inside at last. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

So most continue to queue in patient resignation, joking darkly about “the nightmare”. The experience adds to the cynicism and distrust of government. For all it claims, it’s not a government that cares. Batho Pele’s in the bin. But there’s no choice. You need that document. Your life and ability to function or travel depend on it. 

Some clever people bring camp chairs and lunch boxes. They must have friends in low places who gave them advance warning. 

During the interminable hours, some drop by the wayside and give up. I know the feeling. I was here yesterday. After five hours I gave up too. It felt like dropping out of a marathon. A harried bureaucrat had told us early in the morning that the “system is down”, but after that — silence. It seems nobody knew or cared when it would be up again. 

A sign outside the office. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

Some arrive, see the queue and disappear. 

I discovered, as I posted an SOS on Facebook, that there’s a science to finding a functional Home Affairs office. Some mention Alex. Some say Centurion. Others say take a drive to Randfontein. 

But the problem is, once you are in the queue, you’re stuck. Your mind plays tricks with you. Maybe, maybe, maybe… 

As you stand, sit, perch, you can understand why millions of people don’t have IDs. 

The toilets in a container at the Randburg office. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

And so, as my anger levels increase, I send a message to Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi (whose number I still have from his days as Minister of Health — I’m tempted to share it, but won’t):

“Hello Minister. I hope you are well. I just wanted to say that your home affairs offices are a disgrace. I have spent eight hours so far queuing to renew my passport in Randburg. I can see no reason why it should be as inefficient and contemptuous of people as this. And I hear it’s the same everywhere. It makes me wonder what you are doing as the Minister. Maybe you ought to queue yourself one day to experience what ordinary people do.”

Several hours later I was happy to get a reply. Explaining that he was ill with flu and in bed, the good doctor said:

“I am not sure whether you are asking for my help or you just wanted me to know what you think of me. I am aware of the problems at the Randburg office and have just suspended the manager there to rebuild the office.” 

Cold comfort for me and my queue buddies.

Inside the toilets at the Randburg Home Affairs Department. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

The only good thing I can say is that Home Affairs is a great leveller. In this queue are citizens with little kids, pensioners, people with big cars, people with no cars, all races, all ages. It’s where the nation meets. Everybody but politicians. 

I’m left to have a solitary conversation with myself about state failure. What’s so complicated about processing, producing and disbursing ID documents and passports? If we can’t succeed with something as simple as this, how can we run a sophisticated economy and state? 

As a friend pointed out, what’s to stop Home Affairs having secure online stations at their offices (like ATMs) where an applicant enters all their information so that they need less than two minutes with an official to verify their identity. 

Or why doesn’t Home Affairs introduce a user rating system for its branches? 

People who queued all day, but didn’t cross the line. (Photo: Mark Heywood)

It’s at a coalface like this that you really understand the implications of State Capture, corruption and state neglect. 

I don’t blame the workers. After four hours, when I made it into the actual office, the officials were reasonably personable. It’s the system that fails them. If you starve your public service and public servants, this is what you get. 

Where’s the leadership, you might ask? 

The answer is MIA or being nasty and shifting blame to straw men like illegal immigrants. 

All the president’s men? But do the ministers give a fuck? I doubt it. They get their blue lights, their perks and their arse-licking officials. And like the rest of them, they don’t have to queue, use the public health system or send their children to government schools.

www.samigration.com

South Africa Working Visas

South Africa seeks highly skilled individuals to live and work in SA.

SA Migration Services will provide professional assistance to arrange your work visa for you if you qualify.

Work Visas are regulated in terms of Section 19, Regulation 18 and items 18 (1), 19(2), 20, 21 and 22, of Schedule A.

There are three common types of Work Visas:

• General Work Visa
• Inter Company Transfer Visa
• Critical Skills Visa

General Work Visa

Under the General Work Visa there are very strict requirements. The South African government, although trying to promote work and trade in South Africa, recognize the need to give South Africans the chance to obtain employment ahead of any foreigner.

You will have to prove that you are the only person who can fill that position and that no other South African can play that role. This is done by placing an advert in a national newspaper advertising the position.

A Department of Labour report would need to be obtained.

You will also need to have a job offer/contract from your future employer.

The most important part of the process is skills assessment by SAQA (South African Qualifications Authority) in SA which evaluates your formal qualifications and compares them to a SA qualification. This process is mandatory and for this we would need your academic transcripts and award diplomas. Note under the regulations provision is made for the recognition of work experience in the absence of formal qualifications and this therefore makes provision recognition of prior work experience (RPL).

This is a paper based system which merely compares the foreign qualifications and arrives at an equivalent qualification in SA, and if qualified in SA then no SAQA needed.

Next your employer has to prove that you are the only person that can fill the position and no other South African can fill that role. This is done by placing an advert in a national newspaper advertising the position.

Please note the work Visa is issued in the name of the employer so the person is tied to the employer. If they change the job they will require a new work Visa.

There is some good news for people who are qualified through work experience only and they can qualify if they don’t require formal qualifications, ie SAQA.

Inter Company Transfer Visa

An intra-company transfer work Visa may be issued by the Department to a foreigner who is employed abroad by a business operating in the Republic in a branch, subsidiary or affiliate relationship and who by reason of his or her employment is required to conduct work in the Republic.

An important factor is that the applicant has to have been employed with the company abroad for a period of not less than 6 months.

The Intra company transfer is not designed to be a long term visa. The idea is to bring in foreign workers employed by the company abroad with a branch or subsidiary branch here in South Africa; they work or conduct training for four years, and then return home.

This Visa does not require the hassle of proving the company could not find suitable applicants and it does not require the hassle of verifying an applicant’s formal qualifications. It is based purely on employment. If you are a company that needs to transfer in foreign employers, please contact us and we will make this go as smoothly as possible.

It is important to note that this category of work Visa cannot be granted for more than four (4) years and this type of Visa is not extendable.

Critical Skills Work Visa

The Critical Skills Visa South Africa is for skilled workers whose occupation is on the Critical Skills Visa List for South Africa. This list reflects the occupations that are in demand in South Africa.

The newly published "Skills or qualifications determined to be critical for the Republic of South Africa in relation to an application for a Critical Skills Visa or Permanent Residence Visa"

This category of work visa may be issued to an applicant who falls within a specific professional category or specific occupational class determined by the Minister by notice in the Government Gazette. This is done after consultation with the Minister of Labour and the Minister of Trade and Industry.

If an applicant falls within one of the professional categories listed on the critical skills list and also has the appropriate post qualification working experience in that profession then such applicant may qualify to apply for this category of work Visa.

The applicant also needs to where applicable register with the relevant South African professional accreditation body regulating that industry as stipulated by Minister of Home Affairs. Such body must also confirm the applicant’s skills, qualifications and working experience.

Furthermore, such applicant’s qualifications need to be evaluated relevant to a South African level. An applicant for a Critical Skills Visa may enter South Africa on such visa without having secured a job offer first. It is, however, required of the applicant to confirm employment with the Department of Home Affairs within a period of one (1) year upon arrival in South Africa, failing which, the Visa would automatically lapse.

The Critical Skills Work Visa is tied to an individual and not to an employer so under this Visa a person can leave from one employer to the next without obtaining a new work Visa.

Download the list / government gazette here (Updated: 03 June 2014)

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Allowing asylum seekers the right to work after six months is common-sense

The House – 23 April 2022

Today, the Nationality and Borders Bill will return to the House of Commons, where MPs will vote yes or no on amendments added in the House of Lords.

One of these amendments was tabled by me and supported by peers across the Lords. If passed, it will give people seeking asylum the right to work after they have waited six months or more for a decision on their claim.

It’s a common-sense change. It would be a boost for the Treasury, recruiters and not least asylum seekers themselves, who often wait years for a decision on their claim while battling poverty, isolation and mental ill health.

This 'pull factor' argument is simply not supported by the facts

The government maintains a ban on employment for asylum seekers – introduced by Tony Blair’s Labour government in 2002 – because it says that giving people the right to work will encourage more people to come to the UK.

But this “pull factor” argument is simply not supported by the facts.

Evidence for it remains unclear, unshared or – as many suspect – non-existent. A challenge to minsters from the government’s own Migration Advisory Committee to show proof of a link between the employment ban and a pull factor has so far gone unanswered.

Publicly available and up-to-date figures show no correlation. If there was, asylum migration would look very different to how it does.

Certainly, 28,300 refugees wouldn’t have risked their lives crossing the Channel in boats in 2021 to come to the UK where they cannot work. They would have headed to Sweden, which received just 10,000 applications for refugee status, where they can work after one day.

The 62,000 people who claimed asylum in Spain last year, where they must wait six months to work, would have simply hopped across the border to Portugal, whose 1,350 asylum applicants can get a job after one week.

And the people who applied for asylum in France (103,000) where they must wait six months to work, could have just stopped in – or headed to – Italy (44,000), where they can work after two months.

That some countries with stricter labour access often receive more asylum seekers – while in many cases fewer refugees go to countries with more relaxed rules around work – shows the lack of any link between application numbers and employment rules.

What the overwhelming evidence does point to as “pull factors” are those things that make almost all of us feel safe: our families, our friends, our communities, language, a sense of shared history, a country with a stable government and a respect for human rights.

The government’s argument, however unfounded, is powerful. At a time when Channel crossings dominate headlines, the “pull factor” plays on fears that any perceived loosening of policy around asylum will lead to all the world’s refugees arriving in the UK.

We have an environment in which ministers are so nervous of appearing soft that even a widely beneficial, evidence-based, common-sense policy such as the right to work is rejected because it might make Britain a magnet. Politically, the government feels it’s far less risky to be wrong.

But this is wrong – and while the negative and costly effects of this ban may not seem obvious, they are real.

The ban costs the taxpayer an estimated £210m a year, it leaves asylum seekers in poverty and institutionally dependent, it leaves businesses up and down the country without extra hands at a time of record job vacancies, it takes a terrible toll on people’s mental health and hobbles any attempt at integration and future employment success.

To alleviate ministers’ fears around increased numbers of asylum seekers arriving in the UK, baked in to the amendment is a clause that after three years the government can investigate whether the right to work has encouraged more applications.

Good policy making must be based on robust evidence and be transparent so it can be properly and comprehensively scrutinised.

I hope MPs voting on the right to work amendment are guided by the evidence to bring into law a common-sense change that will benefit not only refugees, but our economy and society

www.samigration.com

 

S

Study Visa

South Africa is emerging as one of the world's most exciting study destinations. This is demonstrated in the rapidly increasing number of international students. Because of international exchange rates, South Africa offers real educational value for money.

A Study Visa may be issued to a foreigner intending to study in South Africa for longer than three months. For the purpose of the Act, study shall mean study at a primary, secondary or tertiary educational institution or any bona fide institution of learning, including but not limited to professional training, cultural, technical, research, vocational, sportive, language and entertainment institutions of learning.

SA Migration Services will professionally help you to get the necessary study Visas to study in South Africa.

South Africa's entire educational system, from primary schools to tertiary institution, is in the process of being redesigned for the post-apartheid future. The result of this process will be a better, more efficient educational infrastructure. South Africa is a nation at the cutting edge of change. This is why it is one of the world's most exciting places to be a student.

You will need a letter of acceptance from the college/uni you will be attending.

Students are allowed to work for 20 hours a week in a casual position.