Appointment note leaves people seeking refugee status vulnerable to arrest  By Joseph Chirume Asylum seekers in Port Elizabeth say they fear arrest because they do not have paperwork proving that they have applied for refugee status. This is because the Refugee Reception Office (RRO) is booking appointments for asylum seekers a year in advance. When GroundUp visited the RRO in Sydenham on 6...

“The non-responsiveness by Home Affairs left no room for us to engage with them” By Tariro Washinyira The Legal Resources Centre (LRC) is asking the Western Cape High Court to order the Department of Home Affairs to commit to a deadline to reopen its Cape Town Refugee Reception Office. The legal battle between refugee organisations and Home Affairs began in 2012 when Home Affairs closed...

Scalabrini Centre hails court order as life-changing for refugees By Tariro Washinyira On Wednesday, the Western Cape High Court handed down a court order that allows the dependents of asylum seekers and refugees to legalise their status in South Africa in a process known as ‘family-joining’. Dependents are defined as spouses, children and other dependents of asylum seekers. In a statement released on Wednesday,...

Health department says it’s the law, but human rights lawyer disputes this By Tariro Washinyira Robertson Hospital confiscated the passport of a 25-year-old Zimbabwean woman on 19 May after she went there to seek treatment. Chiedza* said that on the first day she sought treatment she was handed her hospital file without any questions. But when she returned for a follow-up she was...

Department has to process 150,000 appeals By Zoë Postman The Department of Home Affairs has approached the United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) to help it clear the 150,000 backlog of refugee status appeals, according to Director of Asylum Seekers, Mandla Madumisa. Madumisa was speaking at the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC) on Thursday. The SAHRC subpoenaed Acting Director General of...

But Lawyers for Human Rights disagrees with the court’s reasoning and is appealing  By Ohene Yaw Ampofo-Anti Eight Somali nationals, who currently live in South Africa, are seeking asylum here. But their applications for asylum were turned down by Home Affairs officials. They appealed to the Refugee Appeal Board (RAB), which also turned them down. Represented by Lawyers for Human Rights, the eight...

Asylum delayed is not (necessarily) asylum denied By Ohene Yaw Ampofo-Anti If a foreign national arrives in South Africa unlawfully and takes as long as 15 months to apply for asylum, are they barred from doing so? Is the person liable for deportation or should they be given an opportunity to at least apply for asylum? The Constitutional Court recently considered these...

Constitutional Court ruling overturns Home Affairs directive By Ohene Yaw Ampofo-Anti If you are an asylum seeker and your application to be a refugee is refused, you are still allowed to apply for a visa. The Constitutional Court ruled this in a unanimous judgment handed down in October. Background The case was brought by three asylum seekers whose applications for refugee status had been refused. They...

The Constitutional Court is deciding if Alex Ruta can seek asylum By Zoë Postman Alex Ruta is a Rwandan national who worked for the Rwanda National Security Services. He was sent to South Africa by his superiors in 2014 but he had to enter the country illegally because he did not have a visa. Once in South Africa, Ruta learned that his...