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Home Affairs Minister acted outside his powers in terminating Zimbabwean Exemption Permit system, court told

Details

zimflagGroundUp reports that the lawyers for the Zimbabwe Immigrants Forum told the North Gauteng High Court on Thursday that the Minister of Home Affairs had acted outside his powers by scrapping the Zimbabwean Exemption Permit (ZEP) system.

The Zimbabwe Immigrants Forum (ZIF), which represents about 1,000 ZEP holders, argued that the termination decision was arbitrary and lacking in rationality. “We are sleepwalking into a catastrophe of monumental proportions,” Advocate Tembeka Ngcukaitobi, representing the ZIF, told a full bench of the court. The decision to discontinue the ZEP system, which has allowed Zimbabweans to live, work and study in SA, means 178,000 ZEP holders and their families will be declared illegal foreigners on 1 July 2023, the day after the ZEP system will be deemed to have come to an end. The ZIF has asked the court for an interim interdict to prevent the ZEP system ending on 30 June 2023, so that ZEP holders will not be at risk of being declared illegal foreigners. There was a chance of the ZIF case being settled with the Department of Home Affairs (DHA), but this awaited confirmation from the director-general and minister, said Ngcukaitobi. ZEP holders have been advised by the DHA to apply for alternative visas or waivers by 30 June 2023, though Ngcukaitobi pointed out that few would qualify for visas in terms of the government’s Critical Skills List. If the government wanted to terminate the programme, it had to demonstrate that this decision was linked to a positive change in the economic and political situation in Zimbabwe that gave birth to the exemption programme in the first place, argued Ngcukaitobi. But, contrary to the assurances of the minister, conditions were not getting better in Zimbabwe but were getting worse, said Ngcukaitobi.

  • Read the full original of the report in the above regard by Ciaran Ryan at GroundUp


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