PE High Court hears challenge on closure of Port Elizabeth refugee reception office

The High Court in Port Elizabeth today heard legal arguments regarding the lawfulness of the closure of the Port Elizabeth Refugee Reception Office (“PE RRO”). The office was closed to new asylum seekers on 21 October 2011 after only one day’s notice to local service providers and the refugee community.

The PE RRO has been open since the coming into operation of the Refugees Act in 2000 and has provided asylum services to the refugee community in the Eastern Cape and surrounding provinces. The closest refugee reception office in Cape Town is over 700 km away. 

Existing applicants were told that their files will be finalised at an “annex office” by March 2012 and recognised refugees have been told that they will have to find another office to access services.

A court challenge was brought by Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) and the Refugee Rights Centre at the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, on behalf of the Somali Association of South Africa (SASA) and the Project for Conflict Resolution and Development (PCRD). Both applicants were also acting on behalf of the asylum seeker and refugee community as well as in the public interest.  

It was argued that the closure of the refugee reception office has had a severely prejudicial effect on the asylum seeker community. New applicants had to resort to begging in the streets to get transport money to travel to another refugee reception office. Many hundreds have been left undocumented and subject to arrest, detention and deportation to places such as Somalia due to lack of access to refugee services. 

The Department argued that it was within the sole discretion of the Director-General to make such decisions and that no public consultation was necessary. 

“We are extremely concerned about the attitude of the Director-General in this case,” said David Cote of Lawyers for Human Rights. “Despite the evidence that over 22000 people were assisted at the PE office last year, the Department still does not believe that it is necessary to keep the office open or even to speak to the community about why they want to close it.”

The Department has pointed to an apparent plan to move all asylum services to ports of entry as one reason to close the PE office, despite the fact that it has not even been approved by Cabinet yet. “The Department has put the cart before the horse by closing offices without providing real alternatives to asylum seekers,” Cote continued. 

We call on the Department of Home Affairs, as well as the relative ministers in the security cluster of Cabinet, to reconsider their approach to migration which focuses on excluding asylum seekers and migrants through punishment and harsh conditions rather than on an efficient migration system which takes into account South Africa’s role on the continent and the positive aspects that immigration provides to our economy.    

For more information, please contact: