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A government warning. A court ruling. And a country on edge.
It started in May 2023, when two civil society organisations — the Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town and Lawyers for Human Rights — took the South African government to court. Their target was a practice that had quietly become routine: immigration officials were conducting preliminary interviews with newly arrived asylum seekers, and based on those interviews alone, people were being arrested, detained and deported. No proper refugee status determination interview. No real chance to make their case. The organisations argued this process was bypassing the established asylum system entirely and violating the foundational international principle of non-refoulement — the rule that no one should be returned to a country where they face persecution or serious harm.
The case moved through the courts over the following months, gathering weight as evidence mounted that people were being shut out of the asylum process on purely procedural grounds — because they had entered the country irregularly, lacked an asylum transit visa, or had not reported to a Refugee Reception Office within the required timeframe. By late 2023, the situation had become critical, with some asylum seekers deported without ever receiving a fair hearing.
Then came the Constitutional Court ruling that changed the landscape. The court declared certain provisions of the Refugees Act unconstitutional, finding that these procedural barriers were preventing individuals from having their asylum claims assessed on their actual merits. A subsequent directive from the Department of Home Affairs followed, opening the asylum application process to foreign nationals regardless of how they had entered South Africa. For human rights advocates, this was a significant victory. For sections of the South African public already anxious about immigration pressures, it triggered alarm.
Weeks later, misinformation began spreading rapidly across social media. Claims circulated that the ruling had granted refugees voting rights, that home affairs offices would be overwhelmed, and that South African citizens would be unable to access basic government services. Tensions rose, and reports emerged of communities considering blockades of home affairs offices — a form of vigilante pressure that the government moved quickly to address.
By the time Mmamoloko Kubayi, chairperson of the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Migration, stepped forward to speak publicly, the situation demanded clarity. She was direct: the Constitutional Court judgment does not automatically grant refugee status or permanent residence to anyone who enters South Africa. It does not legalise unlawful migration. What it does, she explained, is require that individuals claiming asylum be allowed access to the determination process so their claims can be properly assessed under the law. Fraudulent or abusive applications, she stressed, will still be rejected through established legal channels.
Kubayi pushed back firmly against the social media narratives, dismissing claims that the ruling confers new rights — including voting rights — as false. She reminded the public that asylum applications are processed exclusively at South Africa’s five dedicated refugee reception centres, not at general home affairs offices, meaning the fears of overwhelmed services were largely unfounded. Her message to communities tempted by vigilantism was equally clear: determining a person’s legal status is the responsibility of the state, not of private citizens or organised groups.
At the same time, she issued a pointed warning in the other direction. Anyone who presents themselves at a refugee reception centre knowing they do not qualify for asylum will face consequences. The system, she insisted, has safeguards — and those safeguards remain in place regardless of the court’s ruling.
Today, the Inter-Ministerial Committee continues implementing President Cyril Ramaphosa’s five-point migration management plan, which covers issues ranging from hijacked buildings to the drafting of new migration legislation following public consultation on a government white paper. The ruling has placed real pressure on a system already stretched thin, and the coming months will test whether South Africa can honour both its constitutional obligations and the legitimate concerns of its citizens — without surrendering either to fear or to injustice.
