- ‘It’s better for me to go back home and live in peace, rather than facing daily harassment and intimidation,’ says Burundian man after anti-immigrant campaigners forced him to close his shop
- Xenophobic violence risks wider fallout, straining South Africa’s relations with other African countries and affecting tra
Jomba Maliyamungu arrived in South Africa after his family fled conflict in the Democratic Republic of Congo. It’s where he grew up, built a successful business, bought a house and planned to marry his South African fiancee.
But at 30, the country where he built his life no longer feels safe.
‘‘I had very high hopes for my future in this country,” he told Anadolu. “But my hopes are now very low. I feel scared whenever I hear that migrants have been attacked.”
His uncertainty is shared by migrants across South Africa as a renewed wave of anti-immigrant activism and violence forces many to confront the question of whether they should continue building lives in the continent’s wealthiest nation.
Over the past few months, vigilante groups including Operation Dudula and March and March have intensified campaigns against undocumented migrants, staging protests and visiting homes, businesses and workplaces to demand identification documents and pressure immigrants to leave.
The campaigns have been accompanied by reports of violence, intimidation, forced business closures and looting, while thousands of migrants from countries including Malawi, Mozambique, Ghana, Nigeria and Zimbabwe have since returned home through voluntary repatriation or deportation.
South Africa’s Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi said last month the country had sent back 53,000 African migrants through voluntary repatriation and deportation processes aimed at cracking down on illegal immigration. The minister did not break down the exact numbers but said 80% of those sent home were from Malawi.
The unrest comes against a backdrop of deep inequality, poverty and an official unemployment rate of around 32%, conditions that anti-immigrant groups increasingly link to migration.
But for migrants who have spent years or even decades building lives in South Africa, the consequences are deeply personal.
Stay or leave?
Some say leaving is not an option.
A Somali shopkeeper in Johannesburg who identified himself only as Sulee said he arrived in South Africa 21 years ago and is now a citizen.
“South Africa is the only place I call home,” he told Anadolu. “I have built my life here.”
He said he has no family to return to in Somalia.
Others who once regarded South Africa as home are reaching the opposite conclusion.
A Burundian man, who asked not to be identified, said members of March and March visited his shop last month and demanded to see his identity documents and trading license.
Despite producing valid documents, he said, they forced him to close the business.
“It’s better for me to go back home and live in peace, rather than facing daily harassment and intimidation,” he told Anadolu.
The man, who has lived in South Africa for nearly a decade, said the experience destroyed his trust in law enforcement and convinced him to consider leaving.
Malipo Lukandamiza Mbalanga, head of African Refugee and Migrants Aid, told Anadolu Tuesday that his organization receives dozens of calls from affected migrants daily seeking help to relocate to other countries.
‘‘Foreign nationals continue to live in fear because they are still being victimized in their host communities and workplaces, yet the perpetrators of these violent actions are not arrested,’’ he said in a telephone interview.
Anti-immigrant groups have continued holding weekly demonstrations and visiting factories, shops, restaurants and other businesses to identify foreign workers and ask them to leave.
The activity has continued despite the government warning private citizens that they have no authority to demand identification documents.
Migration becomes a flashpoint
South Africa has long attracted migrants from across the continent, but migration has become an increasingly contentious political and economic issue.
The UN refugee agency says the country hosts more than 167,000 refugees and asylum seekers, including people from Burundi, Congo, Somalia, South Sudan, Rwanda, and Zimbabwe.
The number of undocumented migrants is disputed, but anti-immigration groups claim there are more than 3 million in a country of roughly 65 million people.
Groups including March and March argue undocumented migration has become a national crisis and accuse foreign nationals of taking jobs and trading opportunities from South Africans.
Many migrants work in the informal economy, agriculture and construction, with anti-immigrant groups arguing that those opportunities should be reserved for local citizens.
Critics, however, say migrants are being used as an excuse for much deeper economic problems.
Mametlwe Sebei, a human rights lawyer and president of the General Industries Workers Union of South Africa, argued that mine and company closures, austerity measures and broader economic policy — rather than migration — are behind the country’s unemployment and poverty.
“Politicians are scapegoating migrants for being the cause of the high unemployment, poverty and crime, which is not true,” he told Anadolu.
Backlash against the backlash
The anti-immigrant campaigns have also triggered a growing response from South Africans who reject the violence.
Last Saturday, hundreds marched in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Cape Town and Durban demanding an end to attacks and intimidation against foreign nationals, as well as accountability for those responsible.
More than 60 civil society organizations representing communities across South Africa and elsewhere on the continent joined the demonstrations.
“Enough is enough, we can’t be silent and watch as our fellow human beings are assaulted, attacked and their businesses looted,” Phakamile Johnny told Anadolu at the Johannesburg march. “This should end now.”
Sebei said the response challenges claims that hostility toward migrants represents South Africans more broadly.
He pointed to people donating food, clothing, water and money to organizations supporting displaced migrants.
“The reality is that many people in this country get along well with migrants,” he said.
He argued that recent violence has been driven primarily by right-wing populists and anti-immigrant politicians seeking to exploit public anger over unemployment, poverty and housing shortages.
“The wave of violence against migrants will pass and they have a future in South Africa,” he said.
Economic and diplomatic fallout
The consequences could also extend beyond migrants themselves.
Dale McKinley, a political commentator and spokesperson for Kopanang Africa Against Xenophobia, said forced closures of migrant-owned businesses have already disrupted the availability and prices of basic goods in some communities.
“Many migrants were very active in the circulation of basic goods in the township economy,” he told Anadolu. “When you disrupt those chains of supply and their networks, the short-term impact is being felt negatively.”
He said the effects could also reach neighboring economies through falling remittances, while labor shortages have reportedly emerged in sectors including agriculture since the xenophobic violence broke out.
Sebei said skilled migrants living in middle-class suburbs have not experienced the same level of violence as those in townships, where unemployment, poverty and crime are higher. But he said anti-immigrant rhetoric has also prompted some migrants in middle-class areas to flee or consider leaving.
The unrest also risks straining South Africa’s relations with other African countries.
Ghana and Nigeria have raised concerns over attacks on their nationals, with both seeking compensation over properties left behind by citizens who fled.
South Africa’s Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni rejected those demands last month, saying legally owned properties remain protected under South African law and their owners are free to sell them.
McKinley added that deportations would not address the economic grievances fueling hostility toward migrants.
“You can repatriate and there can be several hundred thousand people who leave, but this is not going to create jobs in the economy,” he said.
The government has condemned attacks on migrants and deployed security forces in affected areas.
President Cyril Ramaphosa said last month that while illegal immigration remains a challenge, citizens should not take the law into their own hands.
“The responsibility for enforcing our laws rests with the state, and no individual may stop any person to demand documentation or proof of identity or nationality,” he said.
For migrants such as Maliyamungu, however, the question is no longer what the government says, but whether South Africa can again feel like the place where they once imagined their futures.
