DA laments ‘rotten, hostile’ Home Affairs office during oversight visit in Newtown

The Democratic Alliance (DA) visited the Home Affairs office in Newtown, Johannesburg on Wednesday to highlight the lamentable and inimical treatment of the public by corrupt employees.

DA leader John Steenhuisen said the problems faced in Johannesburg were blueprints of home affairs offices all over South Africa, where both citizens and foreign nationals were victims of a collapsed system.

Amnesty International also weighed in, saying people from Zimbabwe and Mozambique were terrified of living in Diepsloot.

Migrants told Amnesty they felt unsafe in South Africa and faced constant harassment from both the police and anti-immigrant vigilante groups, who unlawfully demanded to see their identity documents. Philisiwe Khumalo related how she had been trying to acquire a new ID document since 2017.

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She has yet to obtain one and still only has the old tattered document.

According to Khumalo, the process has been a major struggle.

She said there had been no response from the department to confirm the collection of her ID, upon which she decided to pay them a visit.

“They told me that it appeared registered on the system [as issued] but they couldn’t find it in the office,” she said.

Khumalo said they kept telling her to come back and every time she did, it was the “same story”.

She had asked the department to restart the process but they said “it was not necessary” and that they would look for the presumably issued ID that had got misplaced.

“All these years, for the past five years, I have been experiencing this. Khumalo said the situation was “hurtful and stressful”.

She said the service was poor.

“Today is actually quite different, they are working, we are all shocked and it is clear the officials [of the DA] are here.”

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Busisiwe Matiwane arrived early to apply for IDs for her two sons but said she received very hostile treatment from the security guards and the staff.

She managed to arrange an ID for the one son but “the security guards treated me so poorly and told me they were in charge.”

Matiwane was overcome by tears and said Newtown home affairs was “rotten” and inclined to take bribes.

“Am I not treated properly and assisted fairly because I am poor?”

Gauteng DA leader Solly Msimanga said it was sad and embarrassing that it took an “entire oversight” [inspection] in order for the public to get assisted.