The Financial Gazette

Njabulo Ncube, Assistant Editor

WITH effect from January next year the South African government will be sending home Zimbabweans illegally staying and working in that country without proper documentation, among them the so-called economic and political refuges as pressure mounts on President Jacob Zuma to move with speed to break the political impasse in Harare. Zuma, who is under pressure to deliver social services and living wages to striking civil servants and miners, has announced plans to resume flushing out illegal Zimbabwean immigrants after a temporary reprieve.
Thousands of Zimbabweans fled the country at the height of the economic “tsunami” that rocked the nation in the past 10 years in search for better paying jobs in South Africa, the United Kingdom, Canada and Australia, among other countries.
An estimated three million Zimbabweans are said to be living outside the country’s borders.
The majority of them are in neighbouring South Africa — the largest economy on the African continent.
Last week Zimbabweans in South Africa were shocked when Pretoria announced it would be resuming deportations of illegal immigrants from across the Limpopo River.
The majority of Zimba-bweans there are doing menial jobs at very low salaries much to the chagrin of South Africans who accuse them of complicity in their abject poverty.
The deportations are likely to resume soon after the Christmas and New Year holidays.
Prior to the announcement    of the deportations, Pretoria had introduced a special dispensation for Zimbabweans whereby they could enter South Africa and work for a total of three months before renewing their temporary permits.
Civil rights groups are not happy with the withdrawal of the special dispensation.
They said the political environment in Zimbabwe is still hostile to perceived enemies of the State.
Okay Machisa, the director of Zimrights, a non-governmental organisation that campaigns for human rights, said the political situation in the country is not yet conducive for the safe return of the political refuges.
For example, the constitution-making process has been marred by intimidation and political violence while the national healing process has been stalled due to infighting within the inclusive government.
Precious Shumba, the executive director of the Zimbabwe Exiles Forum (ZEF), said the decision by the South African cabinet was “callous, arbitrary and in violation of the bilateral trade agreement between South Africa and Zimbabwe concluded last year with so much pomp and fan-fare”.
“More poignant is the fact that the resumption of deportations is announced before any adequate measures are put in place to ensure that the asylum seeking process has been made more accessible, and before the Special Permit has been put in place.
“This can only mean that      corrupt police and immigration    officials as well as those who arrest to meet the supply needs of Lindela are back in business, especially as Zimbabwe faces another election,” said Shumba.
He added that the announcement was also ill-timed because it may re-ignite xenophobic attacks against Zimbabweans.
“The unilateral announcement undermines the goodwill that had developed between civil society and other arms of government, especially the Home Affairs Department. ZEF therefore urges government to reconsider the decision and to make efforts to consult more,” said Shumba.
Trevor Maisiri, the executive director of Africa Reform Institute, a Harare-based political think tank, said the intended deportation of Zimbabweans in South Africa was indicative of the economic pressure that is now besetting the region, adding that the situation was being influenced by the global financial crisis, the World Cup bubble burst and the politics in the region.
“The World Cup created a labour pull from within South Africa and the region. The World Cup was also seen by many in South Africa as an intermediary intervention in arresting the deteriorating economic conditions of ordinary people in the country,” said Maisiri.
For example unemployment in South Africa has been rising, with figures of about 21,9 percent in 2008 to about 25,3 percent this year.
A cumulative loss of about 1,1 million jobs was realised during this period. However, most of the temporary employment created by the World Cup has now vanished.
This has been worsened by the fact that most Zimbabweans who were crossing into South Africa in search of employment at a rate of about 500 per day, have all not come back but remain in that country in search of further opportunities.
This has therefore increased pressure on the South African government to deal with a bloated labour market in the wake of declining job opportunities.
South African employees, especially in the public service are now calling for an 8,6 percent increase in salaries and various other increments in allowances.
This is against a Consumer Price Index increase of 3,7 percent in July this year.
Analysts say the call for such an increment was, however, speculative of the benefits ordinary South Africans would have wanted to realise from the hosting of the World Cup rather than based on the actual and rational figure considerations.
This could point towards other influences outside of just economic indications in the initiation and perpetuation of the strike.
The South African government is therefore faced with internal political pressure and unstable job markets. This pressure could be the ultimate influence in enforcing the deportation of Zimbabweans as intimated.
“The reason that Zimbabwe has become stable is not credible given the continuation of economic challenges and the instability of the Global Political Agreement (which South Africa itself has failed to help enforce). This is a scapegoat reason to divert from the real issues behind the proposed deportations,” said Maisiri.
“It’s the ricocheting of political irresponsibility that South Africa has practiced in the Zimbabwe crisis.
“Unfortunately the easy way out for South Africa is to afford priority to its domestic pressures by intending to deport Zimba-bweans back into the cauldron of economic and political tribulations that South Africa itself has irresponsibly failed to influence towards resolution,” he added. 
The deportations, if effected, will obviously bring greater burdens to the Zimbabwean families who rely on money coming from those in South Africa.
It will also increase the cost burdens of looking after extra family members who will have been deported.
The effects of such deportation will, however, dawn heavily on the region in fully exhibiting the subtractive mechanisms that some countries seem to employ from the perennial comradeship that has been experienced, especially in the wake of increased internal political and economic pressure.
The region may start to tear apart in the long run with each country focusing primarily on its own internal socio-economic and political pressures and thereby slowly disregarding the diverse regional effects and concerns.
“The regional unity so far expressed in good or bad will slowly vanish away in light of the setting in of internal discords in the countries across the region,” said Maisiri.
There is a general consensus that the Southern African Development Community (SADC) — as a regional body — has no capacity or mechanism to deal with regional issues and problems in order to avoid such spill-offs now being experienced between South Africa and Zimbabwe.
The deportations will also expose SADC’s failure to unite the region in dealing with socio-economic and political challenges as a bloc.
This will eventually extricate the tongue from the toothless bulldog that SADC has always been. Countries will therefore start to deal with their own issues the way they desire and this will further cause disunity in the region.
Ultimately if such issues are not given a regional focus SADC may end up with such a divided bloc in the long run, which is prone to protracted conflicts across borders.
Jealous Mawarire, an independent analyst who has studied in South Africa, said by targeting Zimbabweans alone Pretoria had raised more questions than answers since that country is also battling illegal immigrants from other countries.
“There are several foreigners who have illegally settled in South Africa ranging from Pakistanis, Somalis, Congolese, Mozambicans and Nigerians and if the department of home affairs in South Africa was keen on genuinely resolving this problem, these illegal immigrants would have been targeted also.
“But as it stands it is only Zimbabweans who have been targeted and one would be naive not to raise suspicions on such an exclusive government policy.
“I am persuaded that there are several reasons that could be informing such a decision. The first could be derived from the SADC Communiqué in which President Zuma believes a lasting solution to Zimbabwe’s problems could be found in free and fair elections sooner rather than later thus the deportations could be viewed in light of election preparations.
“These people need to be home to vote, and since the Electoral Act does not provide for postal voting by this category of nationals in the diaspora, deportation, no matter how cruel, is the only way to ensure they take part in the perceived elections,” said Mawarire.
“The second reason could be a populist move by a government seen by the generality of South African citizens as failing to provide decent social services, reasonable salaries to its civil service and generally found wanting in the area of improving the lives of the majority poor who were pinning their hopes on the hosting of the soccer World Cup as a messianic earthly event with seismic powers to push the burden of poverty off their necks.
“Post-World Cup, the South African government has been inundated by strike threats from virtually every quarter of the civil service including the army and the police and in light of this, the deportation of Zimbabweans is a cheap shot aimed at diverting attention from government shortcomings.
“The third reason could be that the SA government is trying to manage the issue of xenophobic attacks by targeting Zimb-abweans whom, most South Africans believe, are the major cause of the social pressures exerted on service provision in the country.
“This again is not an exhaustive panacea to the problem of illegal immigrants but a populist approach to problem solving.”
Takura Zhangazha, another independent analyst, said the South African government had the prerogative of deporting foreign nationals as with any other government in the world.
He said in the case of Zimbabweans being deported, it was not necessarily a new phenomenon. 
“Zimbabweans have in general always been deported from South Africa but without direct statements from their immigration department. The fact that they have decided to make it public does not mean it has not been happening.
“I think the Zimbabwean government must not respond in a knee-jerk manner to this. It may negotiate for South Africa not to be rush in its decision but it cannot make them completely halt deportations. The Zimbabwe government must come up with a comprehensive national policy on the diaspora.
“This would mean that the question of whether or not Zimbabweans are deported from South Africa has to be dealt with in a holistic manner,” said Zhangazha.

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