Undocumented migrants – The myths, realities, and what we know and
don’t know
Groundup – 22 April 2022
The fact that we don’t actually know how many ‘undocumented’ migrants
there are is, in part, attributable to a systemic problem of state
administration with the Department of Home Affairs.
Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia had planned a demonstration on Human Rights Day 2022 across South
Africa, but alas it was banned by the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police
Department (JMPD). The aim of the ban was to avoid conflict since those
involved in Operation Dudula had threatened to attack the anti-xenophobia
march.
The JMPD could not guarantee the safety of both sides in a possible
confrontation fueled by a concoction of mistruths and misperceptions about
non-nationals being responsible for unemployment, crime and poverty in South
Africa.
This approach by the JMPD further exposed how under-resourced they are and
how incapable they have been in dealing with xenophobic violence in South
Africa. This appears to back up the view that the police, given substantial
media attention for its harassment of non-nationals, has indeed taken a
xenophobic stance.
Xenophobic attacks and harassment of refugees, asylum seekers, economic
migrants and other locally defined “outsiders” are often fueled by politicians’
populist rhetoric and influential people in the news media in South
Africa.
Politicians are riding deep-seated anti-“foreigner” sentiment instead of
presenting workable solutions to the real problems in South Africa, such as the
provision of water, housing, toilets, sanitation and waste management, jobs,
electricity, and the combating of corruption, poverty and unemployment.
But what do we know, or not know about the issues? This article takes a
look at some claims made by ActionSA and other populist movements targeting
non-nationals and weighs them against research evidence.
Last week on social media, Herman Mashaba, who is known for his
controversial anti-“foreign national” rhetoric, reshared ActionSA’s
“immigration blueprint” first released by his party in 2020.
In the document, ActionSA states “it is estimated that 10% of all people
living in South Africa are undocumented migrants”. ActionSA doesn’t cite its
source for that figure and media reportage in 2021 made claims of this number
sitting at four million undocumented migrants, citing Stats SA as a source.
But the truth is, we don’t know how many “undocumented” migrants there
are in the country. In response to claims made in media reports citing the
figure at four million, Stats SA states that these reports were “erroneous” and
that “Stats SA wishes to categorically indicate that it has at no point made
any estimation or comment on undocumented migrants”.
Statistician-General Risenga Maluleke said that “if one uses the output
of foreign-born persons enumerated in Census 2011 and adds to it the net
international migrants for the period 2011-2016, as well as the period
2016-2021 from the 2021 midyear population estimates, one would get an
estimation of 3.95 million persons”, but “this includes migrants of all types
and is collated regardless of legal status”.
The fact that we don’t actually know how many “undocumented” migrants
there are, is in part attributable to a systemic problem of state
administration with the Department of Home Affairs, and in part to the
geographical landscape of Africa, where definitive boundaries between “mine”
and “yours” in communities that live close to borders are non-existent.
So, what do we know?
1. Administrative violence is a reality
Both migrants and South Africans face “administrative violence” by the
Department of Home Affairs regarding documentation, the Brenthurst Foundation
heard from multiple sources in its ongoing research on migrant experiences with
Covid-19 in South Africa.
ActionSA says in its “immigration blueprint” that “the problem is not
that citizens of other countries have chosen our country as their home, but
rather that too many foreigners enter South Africa without following the legal
process of immigration”. But, as an NGO that works with migrants points out,
“nobody wants to be undocumented… the pathways to documentations are limited
and those that are available are skewed”.
We also know that refugee centres of the Department of Home Affairs are
closed in some provinces, in some cases since the inception of Covid and in
other provinces since 2012. So, any asylum seeker or refugee whose documents
expired during this period has been unable to renew their documents, rendering
them “undocumented” – not because they are not willing to renew their
documentation, but because Home Affairs’ centres are not available to enable
them to do so.
The Africa Integration Agenda, as well as Agenda 2063, seeks to enhance
free movement of persons, right of establishment and right of abode for African
citizens among African countries. This includes the elimination of visa
requirements for travel by Africans within Africa, and makes redundant the
issue of whether an African in Africa is documented or not documented.
Consequently, progressive African states in several other regional
economic communities have already instituted visa-free travel for up to 90
days, and visas on arrival have been implemented by other African countries.
Some have even signed bilateral and multilateral visa-free arrangements between
their respective countries, aimed at bolstering trade, job creation and
inclusive growth.
The recently signed African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) will
not work if people cannot move freely within the continent and have to go
through extremely stringent procedures, most of which do not work. If we cannot
move, we cannot trade. Cross-border trade accounts for almost 60% of intra-African
trade.
2. Headhunting of locals hampering the country and the potential of
skilled non-nationals is not being explored
As South Africa is doing its best to discourage skilled Africans from
entering the country, other more developed economies are headhunting the best
and brightest from South Africa, leading to an exodus of many critical skills
from the country. Canada, US, New Zealand, UK and Australia are among those who
are headhunting.
As these developed countries continue to headhunt skills from South
Africa and illustrate to people their clearly laid out pathways to
documentation, it will get to a point where many of the skills that South
Africa needs will have left, rendering the Critical Skills List futile.
The efforts and resources being used to keep Africans from entering the
country would be more usefully directed at preserving the best and brightest we
currently have, and attracting skilled people from across the continent.
Among undocumented migrants are some highly educated and skilled people
who are worth paying attention to. As one respondent said to us in our migrant
survey, “my gardener has a degree in teaching, while my barber is a chartered
accountant”. A skills audit could yield a massive skills harvest for South
Africa’s critical skills deficit.
A rational approach would be based on a skills audit of South Africa’s
13 million unemployed people. The skilled among them should be used to meet
South Africa’s critical skills shortages, with the shortfall being addressed by
skills from elsewhere. To achieve this, non-nationals would have to be properly
and efficiently documented by the Department of Home Affairs.
3. Statelessness of children born in South Africa to non-nationals
causes serious problems
Migration has both stock and flow dimensions. In addition to the
challenges of flows, there are also challenges with the stock of migrants in
South Africa that exacerbates in the long term the issue of undocumented
migrants.
A typical example is the issue of statelessness. A baby born in South
Africa to non-national parents is not issued with a birth certificate. We heard
this from multiple sources in an ongoing study undertaken by the Brenthurst
Foundation.
A baby born to non-national parents in South Africa is rendered
“stateless” with no national identity, and is issued only with a hand-written
note from the Department of Home Affairs. This note serves as proof of the date
of birth, the parents they were born to and the place they were born in.
But this hand-written note is not captured on the national database, the
Brenthurst Foundation heard. When the child turns 16, they are barred from
applying for an identity document that is needed to write matric. But this
problem is not unique to only children of migrant parents. There are stateless children
of South African parents too, as a result of the dysfunctionality of the
Department of Home Affairs.
As one of our key NGO informants in the study explained, “There is a huge
gap in understanding [on the part of the state] when an undocumented child
becomes an irregular migrant liable for deportation, and all protection from
the Children’s Act falls away because the child is now 18 years… So those are
many of the issues we still need to tackle.”
Mothers (South African or otherwise) who give birth far away from a Home
Affairs office face the struggle of attempting to document a child later after
birth. Mothers are faced with obstacle after obstacle to register their child
late. This is not necessarily the fault of a mother, but is rather an issue of
access.
Our research shows that the root of the problem lies with documentation.
The Department of Home Affairs must allow its policy decisions to be informed
by good research and real data.
Right now, populist campaigns against foreigners are using the absence
of real statistics to place exaggerated numbers and inaccurate reasons in the
public domain to justify their xenophobic actions.
www.samigration.com
