Veteran politician Patricia de Lille was officially sworn into office as tourism minister on Wednesday. As the former lone opposition government member in the sixth administration, she now enters a Government of National Unity.
Good party leader Patricia de Lille says that after working with the African National Congress (ANC) and the Democratic Alliance (DA) for almost 15 years, she knows that “the best of all of us, whether you are ANC, DA or Good … put our people first”.
De Lille was speaking shortly before being sworn in as tourism minister on Wednesday at the Cape Town International Convention Centre.
De Lille’s Good party is one of 11 parties in the Government of National Unity (GNU). During the previous administration, De Lille was the only opposition member in the executive.
The Good party has only one seat in the National Assembly after receiving 65,814 (0.18%) of the valid votes cast in the 29 May general election.
When asked about the GNU, De Lille said “We’ve got the experience of coalitions in some municipalities. Some of them with the DA, some of them with the ANC … I’ve worked with the DA for over eight years and the ANC for five years.”
The party has worked with the DA and the ANC at the local level since the 2021 local government elections, either to pass budgets, solve council impasses or in a coalition partnership such as Theewaterskloof in the Western Cape.
De Lille split from the Democratic Alliance in 2018 after a protracted public spat. The current DA leader, John Steenhuisen, was, at the time, tasked with producing a committee report into allegations about the DA caucus, which De Lille led.
De Lille formed the Good party early in 2019, just in time to contest that year’s general election. Her party gained two seats in Parliament and she was appointed as public works and infrastructure minister.
In 2023, De Lille said her party would not join the DA-led Multi-Party Charter, or “Moonshot Pact”, saying, “The forces of the right are consolidating, including the makers and beneficiaries of apartheid, under the auspices of a Moonshot Charter. We cannot let the enemies of progress retake the reins of power.”
Three of the now-defunct charter’s members - the DA, Freedom Front Plus and Inkatha Freedom Party - are part of this GNU.
Back at tourism ministry
De Lille’s reappointment as tourism minister was welcomed by the CEO of the Southern Africa Tourism Services Association, David Frost.
“Minister De Lille’s reappointment is excellent news for the tourism sector,” said Frost.
“Her leadership has been instrumental in navigating our industry through challenging times and we’re excited about the prospects of building on this solid foundation.”
De Lille said she had “worked very hard to make sure that the public sector and the private sector work together”.
She said her next steps would be working with Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber to tackle the visa backlog issue, particularly in markets such as Nigeria, China and India.

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Thousands of people coming into South Africa from war-torn countries or countries rife with political unrest say they live in constant fear of being arrested.This is despite their numerous attempts, some since 2020, to apply for asylum at the Department of Home Affairs. Leaders of immigrant communities in Diepsloot, Gauteng, say they are aware of at least 15 people currently being held at the Lindela Repatriation Centre due to their inability to apply for asylum documents. An Ethiopian man who has been living and working in Diepsloot, Gauteng, for nearly four years says he fears being arrested each time he walks out of his home because he has been struggling for years to get legal asylum documents, GroundUp reports.

Ahmed*, 24, says he arrived in South Africa during the lockdown in 2020 after running away from political unrest in his hometown of Tigray in Ethiopia, in which thousands of people, particularly young men, were killed.

Refugee reception offices were still closed when he arrived, so Ahmed could not immediately apply for asylum. In 2021, he submitted an application online but did not get a response.

He said he has been arrested by police on more than one occasion for not having the proper paperwork but is always released when he shows them proof that he is awaiting feedback on the application he submitted.

In 2023, Ahmed was arrested again and detained at the Desmond Tutu Refugee Centre in Pretoria. 

He travelled there to get answers about his pending application but was arrested instead. He was later released after being booked for another interview. He has returned to the centre several times since then and is yet to get an asylum permit. 

He said: `I don`t know what to do. I`m afraid of being deported because back home in Ethiopia it is not safe.`

Another Ethiopian national from Diepsloot, Salmar*, arrived in South Africa in May 2024. 

Police detained him a few days after his arrival. He was released on bail after explaining his intention to apply for asylum.

He has also been to the refugee centre several times and was turned away each time without getting any help.

Ahmed and Salmar are among more than 10 000 asylum seekers and refugees who have sought help from Lawyers for Human Rights since 2020.

According to Daniel Sherrif, leader of the Ethiopian Community in Diepsloot, five new asylum seekers have been detained by police, while five others are being held at the Lindela Repatriation Centre due to their inability to apply for asylum documents.

This is in addition to five other Congolese nationals also being held at Lindela because they have not been able to get help to apply for documents.

Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber undertook an

Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber undertook an oversight visit to the Cape Town Department of Home Affairs and Refugee Reception Office in Epping where he received an update on the functionality of the home affairs services for citizens and for refugees and asylum seekers and also conducted a site inspection of the centre. (ER Lombard/Gallo Images)

Gallo Images

In May, the Scalabrini Centre in Cape Town, represented by Lawyers for Human Rights, approached the courts for an interdict to prevent authorities from arresting and detaining new asylum seekers, the lawyers said in a statement. 

This matter will be argued in the High Court in Cape Town on 27 August.

Court battle looms

Meanwhile, Lawyers for Human Rights has raised concerns with the frequency of cases in which asylum applicants being arrested while at or on their way to refugee reception centres. 

`New applicants for asylum have been subject to arrest, detention, and deportation without the opportunity to undergo a refugee status determination interview. This process effectively denies individuals access to the asylum system, leaving them vulnerable to deportation to their home countries, where they face persecution, violence, war, detention or even death.`

Sharon Ekambaram, who manages Lawyers for Human Rights, says the organisation`s offices in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban and Musina have been inundated with more than 10 000 cases of asylum seekers and refugees facing documentation challenges since 2020.

Ekambaram said most of the asylum seekers they have been assisting are yet to have their applications finalised. This adds to the Department of Home Affairs` existing refugee backlog, said Ekambaram.

`Home Affairs is doing nothing to make the process of applying for asylum and refugee documents accessible, and this must change,` she told GroundUp.

Claudia Marie Bernard Kayitane, director of the immigrant advocacy organisation Pax Afrika Network, said: `Laws that observe the right to protection for refugees continue to fail us. A lack of documentation exposes them to increased insecurity.`

Requests for comment sent to the Department of Home Affairs since 21 June have received no response.

Newly appointed Home Affairs Minister Dr Leon Schreiber has announced that South Africa’s Smart ID cards and passports will be updated with enhanced security features in the coming years.

Schreiber announced the development in the Department of Home Affairs’ 2024/2025 budget vote speech on Monday.

“Both the passport and smart ID card will be refreshed and updated in order to enhance the security features of these documents, with the aim of building trust by more countries and organisations worldwide,” said Schreiber.

While Schreiber did not provide a specific date for the changes, he said the documents would be updated “during the current administration”.

Barring an unprecedented early election, the current administration is set to serve until the next general elections in 2029.

Although it is unclear what security shortcomings the Smart ID card might have, the South African passport’s vulnerability to fraud has been widely reported.

Former Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsaledi recently lamented the impact of passport fraud on South African travellers.

“Every single South African is a victim because we are now forced to apply for visas when we visit countries such as the United Kingdom (UK),” Motsoaledi said. “This was not the case before syndicates like these denigrated our passports.”

“We will, therefore, have no mercy to anybody whatsoever, Home Affairs official or outsider, who gets involved in these dastardly acts. We are doing so to protect the interests of all South Africans”.

Motsoaledi’s comments came after the sentencing of a Pakistani national for corruption and bribing of twelve Home Affairs officials in Krugersdorp to assist in producing fraudulent passports.

The syndicates typically create fraudulent documents using the identification information of recruited South Africans who are unlikely to travel abroad and willing to sell their identities.

When the applicant’s photo needs to be taken, the corrupt officials help to swap them out with the foreign national.

With the photo featuring the face of the actual criminal using the document, border officials are unlikely to flag them as forgeries.

One controversial attempt to mitigate this practice was a decision by low-cost airline Ryanair in 2022 to screen South Africans with an Afrikaans-only general knowledge questionnaire on the country before they could board its planes.

The issue not only left non-Afrikaans speakers feeling ostracised, but several Afrikaans speakers also found the questionnaire’s questions too difficult.

Before scrapping the measure following severe backlash, Ryanair described it as an “additional safety assessment” to confirm whether they were correctly documented before travel.

“As language proficiency is the least intrusive further safety assessment method, this questionnaire is conducted through Afrikaans, one of South Africa’s most prevalent official languages,” the airline said.

Good news for naturalised citizens

Schreiber also shared good news for naturalised citizens who have not yet been able to apply for Smart ID cards for more than a decade.

The minister said that support for Smart ID cards was gradually being phased in, with 280 cards already issued and another 697 in progress.

“Once the system has been adjusted to verify compliant applications, all naturalised citizens will be able to visit any Home Affairs office equipped with live-capture facilities to apply for their smart ID cards,” said Schreiber.

Schreiber is a member of the Democratic Alliance, which has long pushed Home Affairs to enable Smart ID card support for naturalised citizens.

Smart ID cards have primarily been restricted to locally-born citizens since they were launched in 2013.

As a result, naturalised citizens who have lost, stolen, or damaged green ID books must visit one of only a handful of offices that still support the issuing of the older document.

The DA argued that this infringed their rights as citizens.

The issue could have become more serious if the department proceeded with its plan to declare green ID books invalid.

Home Affairs only announced it started a pilot of Smart ID card issuing to naturalised citizens in December 2023, in a parliamentary response provided to DA MP AC Roos in March 2024.

Expats’ happiness with their lives in South Africa has improved considerably over the past year, but they still face several pressing issues, particularly those related to safety.

This is according to the latest Expat Insider 2024 survey by InterNations, where South Africa ranks 29th out of 53 countries in the overall rankings of “Best Destinations for Expats in 2024.”

This is a 19-spot improvement from 2023, climbing out of the bottom 10 after spending four consecutive years there.

“In early 2024, more than 12,500 expats from around the world shared with us their thoughts on what it’s like to live and work abroad [representing] 175 nationalities living in 174 countries or territories,” said InterNations.

“This gain [in South Africa’s ranking] was spurred on by improvements across all five indices,” being Quality of Life, Working Abroad, Expat Essentials, Ease of Settling In and Personal Finance, said InterNations.

Looking at these individual indices rankings (out of 53), South Africa placed:

• Personal Finance  18th;

• Expat Essentials  22nd;

• Ease of Settling In  23rd;

• Working Abroad 40th;

• Quality of Life  43rd.

As shown above, South Africa’s ranking is skewed by the Working Abroad and Quality of Life indices, with the country ranking among (and the) lowest in several subcategories of these indices.

Specifically, South Africa ranks the lowest out of all the measured countries in terms of Safety and Security.

“The ranking is pulled down by personal safety and political stability, both of which are also dead last (53rd),” said InterNations.

“Justifiably so, as more than half of expats (54%) in the country rate personal safety as poor, compared to just 8% globally �` and for political stability, a much higher share than the global average rate it negatively, 47% vs 16% globally.”

Additionally, the country is weighed down by the Travel & Transit subcategory, ranking 52nd. This is due to poor affordability (53rd) and availability of public transport (52nd). 

Nearly two-thirds of respondents (65%) agree that it is not easy nor safe to get around South Africa on foot or by bicycle (vs. 13% globally).

Conversely, South Africa does best in the Personal Finances Index (18th) as well as the Housing (9th) and Leisure Options (10th) subcategories.

South Africa achieves its best position in the Personal Finance Index, ranking 18th. It scores well in the general cost of living, placing 15th, and in disposable household income, being adequate for a comfortable lifestyle, where it ranks 19th.

Impressively, 73% of expatriates in South Africa report that their disposable income is sufficient or more than enough, exceeding the global average of 70%. 

Despite these positive indicators, South Africa receives a relatively modest ranking of 31st for expatriates’ satisfaction with their financial situations.

Looking at the subcategories, Environment & Climate (ranked 16th) and Healthcare (ranked 23rd) showed strong performance as well. Specifically, the natural environment ranks third and climate & weather fifth in their respective areas of satisfaction. 

InterNations said that outcome is expected, considering over ninety-five percent (95%) of participants positively rated South Africa’s nature and wildlife. This is notably higher than the global average of eighty-two percent (82%). 

Furthermore, eighty five percent (85%) of respondents are satisfied with the weather, which greatly surpasses the global satisfaction rate of fifty-eight percent (58%).

Healthcare availability is above average (22nd) and of good quality (13th), but it could be more affordable (32nd) with better equal access to healthcare services (38th), given that the majority of these responses are looking at private healthcare.

Nearly a third of expats (32%) rate the current access negatively (vs. 21% globally).

According to the survey, the average age of expats is just over 51 years old, with the majority being male.

The biggest sectors for expats is seen to be hospitality, construction and information technology. 

Looking at the overall rankings, the top 10 best countries for expats are:

Rank Country

1 Panama

2 Mexico

3 Indonesia

4 Spain

5 Colombia

6 Thailand

7 Brazil

8 Vietnam

9 Philippines

10 UAE

According to the rankings, the bottom-ranked countries for expats are:

Rank Country

53 Kuwait

52 Türkiye

51 Finland

50 Germany

49 Canada

48 Norway

47 Italy

46 Malta

45 Ireland

44 UK