Oh yeah, we’ll abuse it!
South Africa’s immigration minister says Zimbabweans are welcome to enter the country without visas, a change expected to slow the flow of thousands of asylum seekers from the troubled northern neighbor.
Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula says Zimbabweans no longer need to apply and pay for visas before travelling to South Africa. Instead, they can apply for a free 90-day visitor’s permit at the border.
She says Zimbabwe citizens can also apply to do casual work while in South Africa.
Mapisa-Nqakula appeared with her two Zimbabwean counterparts to make the announcement Monday.
South African officials believe many of the 8 000 or so Zimbabweans who apply daily for asylum status will now opt for the visitors permit.
bout time. far too many pages in a zim passport wasted on those visas. in the uk you can visit for 180 days. just found out that my five year visa expired – should have got a ten year one. the sa-zim visa thing has always been very stupid – tit for tat regime.
So, basically, open gates is it? Anyway, screw it, we’ve had the same shit with Bots.
Way overdue for real – and some cooling down of arrogance. This should have been done when the ANC came into power in the 1990s…
In 1994, the new black SA government took the old apartheid Immigration Act (which regarded whites as South African citizens and blacks as non-SA citizens who lived in the homelands and required a Pass to enter SA) and adapted it to exclude black Africans from their new-found access to wealth. The act uses the same exclusive monetary, educational, skills etc permit requirements that are relatively easy for a white/westerner to acquire than for your average Takunda from Wedza, to restrict entry and deny residence…
Look up a brilliant essay by Neocosmos on how the post-apartheid SA state created anti-African xenophobia by this unwarranted fear that other black africans would deprive black south africans of the wealth they perceived to have won back…
Mos native, could i possibly provide an alternative argument. It all has to do with economics, interestingly enough Zimbabwe provided a case study in the 80’s. If you look at the casual worker, i.e the farm labourer and waiter in SA about 50% are Zimbabwean, earning sub-minimal wages but providing enough labour for production and increasing productivity. If Zim were to change overnight (i.e bob goes) or an improvement in economic affairs in Zim the first people to head back are the casual workers ( easily transferable). imagine an enmass movement, what this will do to output in SA.
The advice of wise economist would’ve been, since the resuscitation of Zim is inevitable its better we create an enabling environment for the casual worker starting with giving them status. Status will warrant certain rights Bla bla bla creating an incentive to stick around. Coz SA peeps are not willing to do the donkey work anywhere. Zim in the 80’s did the same thing, especially when the civil war in Mozambique ended, the foreigners were given passports (status), ID’s albeit with an alien tag on them.
The politician then sets in and spins, good overtures bla bla bla…
the truth is, they need Zim labourers more than ever, especially with the world cup coming through.
You’ve nailed it.
What I have noticed personally, and which research dating back to the regional 1900s transvaal mineworkers goes into detail on, is that, hardly any African foreigners, Zimbabwean or otherwise, want to settle permanently in SA.
The casuals you mentioned are the most mobile, but also, even the professionals, on work permits, permanent res, etc are also eyeing an opportunity to return – many are buying property in Zim or building kumusha proper for retirement. Those who do not visit Zim regularly are usually only restricted by lack of funds or legal status in SA. The higher standard of living in SA can never make up for the feeling of second rate citizenship one feels as a foreigner in SA. Even those applications for SA citizenship are more for access to better jobs, business, property, vehicle loans, etc than an attempt to settle permanently.
JB, (on the Livepool vs ManU front) Okay, so Liverpool kicked our arses both times we met.I give you that! But, ain’t it the league tables that count. Because from them, looks like the Reds must have fucked up big time with some sub-standard teams. Face it, it is the points that count. Just accept that this, again, isn’t your year ans ManU are the Champions. 🙂
I really thought ManU were going to lose it for a while there. They very nearly did.
Okay, so lemme get this straight. There’s asylum seekers currently sleeping outside Home Affairs, trying to get permits/residency/asylum etc etc. So they’re basically besieged by Zimbos, yeah?
There’s illegals running around SA, doing whatever it takes to survive, right? So they’re basically besieged by Zimba hoes and thieves and what-not.
Now, if all these peeps are given 90-day permits, what do you think happens AT THE END OF NINETY DAYS???!?
You can legally bundle them all into a truck and ship them over the border. And I assume you can only take this 90-days once every six months or something, and maybe can only extend by a max of 14 days (I’m taking Botswana example).
What this means is ALL the asylum seekers and illegals who will have jumped at this “chance” will be home before they can say “asseblief”.
Yes, it’s overdue, and normalisation is great, but for others, it will mean a short sharp trip home.
Watch.
The 90-day is for those wishing to pop in and out for business. Once you in then you can apply for the 6-month casual work permit they introduced recently for those already in SA…
Did you guys hear about the stolen GT taken in for services in SA by a Zimbo that was stolen in the UK.
http://www.thetimes.co.za/News/Article.aspx?id=993037
Yeah. Fucking idiots
@JB – my comment from this morning is still being moderated!?
PMd u about picking up the zeitgeist DVD…
@ACM…those dudes are idiots on so many fronts, dont even want to get started on them…SA should deny them 90-day visas..!
On that immigration issue, crime and social service strain are the xenophobes excuses; contrary to general opinion, official SAPS stats (which they are reluctant to make public) show that foreign nationals in SA account for less than 2% of criminal convictions… all the drug dealing Nigerians, whoreing Zimbabweans, thieving Mozambicans, narcotics-manufacturing Pakistanis, mafia-linked Italians and human trafficking Chinese pale in comparison to the citizen fraudsters, carjackers, housebreakers, rapists, murderers, muggers and drug dealers…
Also, why I think everyone should just back off and let the visas flow is that prior to 1994, SA Immigration Policy of the National Party, in its apartheid heyday, encouraged White immigration from anywhere and everywhere – you just had to be white – and regardless of educational qualification, age, skills, financial status, a white person would be granted SA CITIZENSHIP within a few MONTHS.
This enabled all and even the most barely literate Europeans and North and South Rhodesians, who were escaping dead-end jobs in Europe, or, in the case of the latter, the horror of imminent black commie government, in soon-to-be Zambia and Zimbabwe, to emigrate to Natal Province and be guaranteed prosperity under the National Party’s policy to eradicate white poverty in SA.
The irony that Zimbabweans don’t see is these particular gentlemen and their girlfriends are the metaphor of present day Zimbabwe and whats wrong with our idea of success. If you can call them idiots, and rightly so… Zimbabwe is also full of IDIOTS-
@ Mos Native, did you major in conspiracy theories during your time in Cuba??
@ACM – touche!
Yes, the environment in Zim has resulted in plenty of Zimbos, not all though, now having a warped take on success…
just joking..
Really, those guys are a special brand of idiot. I mean, taking the thing for a SERVICE? Yeah, what did they expect was gonna happen?
Fools. Busy flossin’ around Harare in stolen cars.
Yes, I am a HATER!
Even though the idiocy of taking a STOLEN Bentley GT for a service is unparalleled; I mean there are what, two, Bentley delearships in the whole country and you think they dont know how many and to who they have sold their cars…tchk…; anywho, the “look at me, Ive made it” lunacy is not restricted to Zimbos… or educational level.
Here in SA there are plenty of black college graduates who get a decent first salary and then financially screw up their lives by getting a fancy brand new beemer or audi that swallows 2/3 of their net income for the next five years…
Well the car needed servicing. what would you have suggested, Siya So? considering you cant service it anywhere else
Siya so…lol…went there a few times back then, Zim ma One.
Thug Life 101 – Dont FLOSS with stolen shit.
Seriously, steal and move the loot quick, let the next idiot worry about the service… 🙂
how about capitalism 101: work hard, earn well and play well. GT comes as a fringe benefit- from Bentley
capitalism 202: well lets make sure we pass 101!
Today i opened the times, to read the most shocking news since Arsenal lost to Manchester, the minister of culture believes that the four big clubs in the UK should share some of their wealth.
The reasoning, in my humble opinion is based on a typical 5yr old kid- since the four big clubs have been making money from tv rights in going all the way in European games, other teams have not been participating and hence the big 4 have an unfair competitive advantage.
then the issue of british players’ quota….
so goes my everyday encounter with the anti-capitalist mantra,
ACm, I resent the ‘implication’ that Arsenal has anything on Man U. And it wouldn’t hurt if said clubs gave some more back.
@ Tara, just to show how serious the implication is:
http://www.news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/africa/8036367.stm
It’s fucking stupid. The BIG FOUR are just that, big. If any other club can’t compete, that’s their own fucking problem.
If their teams can’t progress to Europe and earn the money that comes along, fuck them. They need to get better, have better coaches instead of revolving doors, develop their own young players instead of buying castaways and mediocre Eastern Europeans and African “stars”.
With the right structures, any club can be huge and if there’s potential, the big money boys will come calling (look at City). Besides, there’s already so much monmey floating in the English game that no club can claim to be “small” and still operate in the Premiership and (yes) the Championship.
Fuck that shit. wanna be big? Win a goddamn game once in a while. Damn!
The logic is a bit flawed;
The top four are dominant because they buy brilliant but expensive foreign players – who bring in money;
So they must share their income so the other teams can also get better – how? by also buying foreign players…right.
But you then also want them to not be able to have substantial numbers of foreign players by introducing quotas???????
The English Premier League is neither national nor English.
They are merely hosting the richest and most entertaining football league in the world. They must either be grateful and enjoy the priviledge of having this league played in their backyard or they can lose all the entertainment to another country and go back to community clubs with 100% English players.
With that said – no quotas and yes, for entertainment’s sake, spread the wealth! Watching the top four dominate is as interesting as a Williams sisters final 🙂