Lawyers for Human Rights Press Statement on World Refugee Day 20 June

World Refugee Day was established by the United Nations to honour the courage, strength and determination of women, men and children who are forced to flee their homes under threat of persecution, conflict and violence. On the eve of World Refugee Day in South Africa hundreds of refugees, asylum seekers, citizens and residents alike converged on the Marabastad refugee office to show their dissatisfaction with the way in which they are being treated by the South African authorities. This will be followed by protests in Port Elizabeth and a march to Parliament in Cape Town.

These protests are in response to a plan by the Department of Home Affairs to close down metropolitan refugee reception offices.  Implementation of the plan commenced with the closure of the Crown Mines office in Johannesburg in May 2011. This was closely followed by the closure of the Port Elizabeth refugee office in November 2011. Both these closures were challenged in the courts and the courts have held that the decision to close these refugee offices was unlawful and have asked Home Affairs to revisit this decision. In the Port Elizabeth legal challenge the Eastern Cape High court even ordered the refugee office to re-open to existing refugees and asylum seekers as well as newcomers. To date this has not taken place.

According to Kaajal Ramjathan-Keogh, head of the Refugee and Migrant Rights Programme at Lawyers for Human Rights, “These refugee office closures coupled with the decision to move asylum processing to the border areas has caused considerable anxiety within the refugee community. South Africa is disregarding its international obligations to protect refugees and these moves are counter-productive”. These new policy changes appear to be a mechanism to avoid dealing with the real problems of a poor refugee status determination process and an inability to process claims within a reasonable time period coupled with the rampant corruption within the asylum system.

Ramjathan-Keogh continued, “The Department of Home Affairs has furthermore failed to consult with members of the refugee community or interested parties working in this sector who would have valuable inputs on these new policy considerations. The plan appears to be badly thought out and has not made any provision for asylum seekers to receive basic services or be able to access food and shelter. The border processing may lead to the development of shanty towns around these processing points.”

According to the UNHCR 42.5 million people worldwide ended 2011 either as refugees (15.2 million), internally displaced persons (26.4 million) or in the process of seeking asylum (895,000). Despite the high number of new refugees, the overall figure was lower than the 2010 total of 43.7 million people, due mainly to the offsetting effect of large numbers of internally displaced people (IDPs) returning home: 3.2 million, the highest rate of returns of IDPs in more than a decade. Among refugees, and notwithstanding an increase in voluntary repatriation over 2010 levels, 2011 was the third lowest year for returns (532,000) in a decade. Overall, Afghanistan remains the biggest producer of refugees (2.7 million) followed by Iraq (1.4 million), Somalia (1.1 million), Sudan (500,000) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (491,000). South Africa has a diverse refugee population who come from as far away as Somalia, Ethiopia, Eritrea and the Democratic Republic of Congo as well as from our neighbour in Zimbabwe.

South Africa has obligations to protect refugees while they are unable to return to their countries of origin because of a fear of persecution. This protection has been in short supply of late and Lawyers for Human Rights calls on the Department of Home Affairs to:

 -          Re-open the RROs that have been closed, in line with court judgements on the matter, and for these RROs to provide services to new as well as existing asylum seekers and refugees;

-          For the Department of Home Affairs to halt its plans to further close other RROs starting with the proposed closure of the Cape Town Refugee Reception Office;

-          For DHA to embark upon a full, comprehensive, open dialogue with civil society stakeholders, service providers and affected communities on the plan to move RROs to border areas;

-           To put into place plans which will decrease and nd to corruption and abuse by some DHA officials, police  and security officers and for all DHA and security personnel to abide by the Batho Pele Principles;

-          For everyone living in South Africa to have access to documentation without fear, favour or prejudice and for policy to take into account international and domestic obligations including the universality of human rights - whoever we are, wherever we are;

-          For South Africa to honour its international obligations to provide effective and real protection to refugees.

World Refugee day will be commemorated in an event co-organized by UNHCR, the Department of Home Affairs, Cormsa and other refugee organisations. The Soweto Gospel Choir will perform on World Refugee Day at the Orlando East Community Hall in the Johannesburg district from which the Grammy Award winners take their name. Several other WRD events in South Africa will promote tolerance of refugees in the country. Art exhibits, featuring work by refugees, will be held at the Holocaust Museum in Cape Town and the Alliance Française in Durban.

In Polokwane on 23 June at 9 am the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, The Jesuit Refugee Service in collaboration with the Office of the Premier- Limpopo will commemorate World Refugee Day at Seshego Stadium in Polokwane. The 2012 WRD theme is: "One Family Torn Apart by War is One Too Many"

However, after these celebrations we will return to a situation of poor service delivery to refugees who remain voiceless and powerless to change this status quo.

For more information see Lawyers for Human Rights and Consortium for Refugees and Migrants in SA on Facebook.