EDITORIAL: Shift the paradigm on immigration

WERE it not for municipal by-laws, the area outside the Marabastad refugee reception centre run by the Department of Home Affairs could easily become a tent city akin to a makeshift refugee camp.

Marabastad is one of the centres where refugees have to go to secure the necessary documentation to remain legally in SA. It has been identified in a report by Lawyers for Human Rights and the African Centre for Migration and Society as a hotbed of corruption, specifically bribe solicitation by officials.

The situation, according to the report, is "an outcome of a deliberate government choice" to avoid addressing fundamental issues in the system.

We couldn’t agree more.

Corruption generally grows from inefficiencies that make a system unresponsive to the needs it is supposed to address.

This produces two destructive and correlated outcomes.

The first is that those who seek positive outcomes to address their desperation have to produce incentives, often illegal, to ensure that someone inside the system negates its inherent obstacles, justified or not. These incentives manifest themselves as bribery and other forms of corrupt activities.

In the second instance, those who run the system may seek to profit from its inefficiencies by demanding incentives to navigate its obstacles.

It is worse when the system is inherently ineffective.

The report shows how the two come together in a deadly cocktail of desperation and corruption, which appears to have grown worse despite several attempts to clean up the Department of Home Affairs.

Regardless of the tough actions that may have been taken against corrupt officials, there is likely to be continuing graft until the South African government accepts that its immigration policy is woefully dishonest and inadequate.

At the heart of the gridlock is the government’s unwillingness to recognise and be honest about what type of immigrant we need. Given the scarcity of critical skills in different sectors of the economy, and even critical professions such as teaching or boilermaking, the country should be able to tell how many more people it needs in the short term to fill the gap.

But it does not.

For instance, applying for a work permit is like navigating a maze full of deep trenches and booby traps. As a consequence, economic migrants are forced to apply for refugee status when they could be gainfully employed elsewhere, or start enterprises.

It is of no help that the government often refuses to acknowledge that several African governments are autocratic and abusive towards their citizens.

Despite the hazards of being in a foreign country in which there is the distinct possibility of becoming a victim of gratuitous xenophobic violence, people still come to SA.

Our human rights-based political system will always be a magnet for the abused from elsewhere.

Immigration policy is often unpleasant business.

SA’s policy has to provide clarity on who is welcome in the country and who will have difficulty securing residence. Until this is done, and systems are put in place to process the different types of immigrant, the problem of corruption will persist.

Many immigrants have to endure hardship just to get to SA and it is an indictment that we cannot afford them the basic dignity of knowing where they stand so that they may find suitable ways of rebuilding their lives.