Programme News
19 February 2013
(News)
Refugees and asylum seekers receive substantially less protection from the government than they used to when the asylum system was first established in the 1990s. This is claimed by Lawyers for Human Rights and the African Centre for Migration and Society, in a new report published last week.
The report, which monitors trends over the past two years, says South Africa has experienced a de facto...
18 February 2013
(News)
Tighter control over immigration — as has been suggested by African National Congress (ANC) policy adopted at the Mangaung conference in December last year — will not solve South Africa’s concerns over jobs and crime, but will make these problems worse, according to refugee rights groups and researchers.
A range of civil society organisations this week made presentations to...
16 February 2013
(News)
South Africa is experiencing a major shift in its approach to asylum-seekers and refugees, Lawyers for Human Rights (LHR) said on Friday.
“The changes amount to a substantial reduction of asylum-seeker and refugee protection culminating in increased danger of sending people back to face persecution,” LHR said in a statement.
“Since early 2011, these shifts have resulted in group...
15 February 2013
(Press release)
The report Policy Shifts in the South African Asylum System: Evidence and Implications, compiled by Lawyers for Human Rights and the African Centre for Migration and Society, has revealed that South Africa is experiencing a major shift in the approach to asylum-seekers and refugees – the most significant since the asylum system was established in the 1990s. The changes amount to a...
13 February 2013
(News)
His routine and conviction never wavered. He’d shave the person’s head, lay his hand on the bald pate and ask for God’s forgiveness for the condemned. Then, he’d strap the person into Virginia’s electric chair.
Jerry Givens was the state’s chief executioner for 17 years – at a time when the commonwealth put more people to death than any state...
13 February 2013
(News)
Foreign nationals will no longer be able to own land in South Africa once government’s land policy is finalised and passed into law, Land Reform Minister Gugile Nkwinti said on Tuesday.
"All people who are foreign nationals will not own land, but will lease land on a long-term basis," he said.
Nkwinti was responding to a question during a "dialogue" with farm workers in...
7 February 2013
(Press release)
The Constitutional Court has given judgment in a case concerning the constraints placed on municipalities when entering land on which people’s homes are situated.
The applicants’ homes are situated on land owned by the Rustenburg Local Municipality. These homes were dilapidated and the municipality employed a contractor to carry out work on the land as part of a housing development...
7 February 2013
(News)
On the streets of inner-city Johannesburg, refugees and asylum-seekers are participants in a thriving informal economy, plying their trade as tailors, barbers and street vendors.
South Africa’s laissez-faire policy towards its refugee population means they have little choice but to fall back on their own skills and creativity to survive. And despite the many challenges they face - from...
31 January 2013
(News)
Frederik Ngubane was born in South Africa to South African parents 22 years ago but, lacking any proof of his origins or nationality, he lives a shadowy, marginal existence. He cannot travel, study or secure formal employment and has lost count of how many times he has been arrested for being undocumented.
Not considered a national by South Africa or by Kenya or Uganda - the two countries where...
28 January 2013
(Press release)
South Africa has again been gripped by images of violence, anger and looting in the wake of a decision by Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs Minister Richard Baloyi and the Municipal Demarcation Board to merge two municipalities near Sasolburg in the Free State. By Thursday, four people had been reportedly killed and many more displaced after a week of violent protest against the...