Patients being turned away from Tshwane hospital ‘based on accent’. Picture: iStock
Tensions flared up yesterday outside Kalafong Hospital in Atteridgeville, west of Pretoria, with foreign patients and staff saying they fear for their lives.
The hospital has been rocked with protests since 4 August by anti-migrant organisation Operation Dudula, preventing patients they suspected were foreigners from entering the facility.
The Gauteng department of health has since obtained a court interdict in response to the ongoing protest.
With little to no police presence, disgruntled Operation Dudula members argued the hospital has put South Africans second and placed the needs of undocumented foreigners first for services and jobs.
Protester Thando Sekete, alleged that the hospital employed foreigners to do “basic jobs such as cleaning and dealing with patients’ files” while young locals were without jobs.
“We are not fighting with anyone, we want to hold the government and the hospital’s management accountable.
“This hospital must have immigration officers, when anyone comes in they should provide documents – if they don’t have; then they should be turned back, it’s that simple,” said Sekete.
“If we constantly overlook our laws in the country, they will continue to disrespect the country and make it lawless. We all have rules; they have theirs, we have ours. Let’s respect each other.”
Asked why they turned back people who they suspected were foreign, Sekete said: “Many of the people you are talking about did not want to produce documents which to us simply says you are undocumented and illegal.”
However, one staff member who asked to remain anonymous, said the protesters were not interested in checking their papers.
“They just want us gone from this place. They don’t even care about the sick and frail, as long as they think you’re a foreigner, they’ll decide your fate,” he said.
He laid bare the horror of threats some of the patients and employees received and made reference to Zimbabwean Elvis Nyathi, who was stoned and burnt to death in April for allegedly being a thief and not having a passport.
“There’s no way you will not be scared because when you think of the horror Nyathi went through, just by speculation, you will see they are not just making threats,” he added.
A patient who was allegedly turned back for the past week said her prenatal pills had run out two weeks ago and, ever since, she has been denied access by the protesters, with some even threatening to beat her to death.
“I’m scared they are going to kill me and my unborn child, but at the same time I cannot just sit and not try to get the medication,” said the heavily pregnant migrant as she cried uncontrollably.
Political analyst Dr Levy Ndou previously told The Citizen the government’s failure to take a stance on immigration in SA was giving power to vigilante groups to “do as they please”.
Legal analyst advocate Modidima Mannya said SA’s biggest fault line was taking a humanitarian approach and ignoring the value of immigration laws – whose primary objective is to protect the country’s sovereignty first and then to protect citizens.
“The main objective of immigration laws is to regulate and control the movement of people in and out of a country,” Mannya said.
Although organisations like Doctors Without Borders criticised the ongoing “xenophobic” protest outside the facility, it seems the hostility to serving migrants in SA’s health facilities was intensifying.
Last week, Limpopo health MEC Phophi Ramathuba received mixed reactions for berating a Zimbabwean patient who was seeking medical assistance, claiming migrants were overburdening the health system.
Doctors Without Borders said there was an increasing trend in Gauteng hospitals, where migrants are denied access by staff.
“They’ve even demanded that critically ill patients, who are migrants, must be ‘unplugged’ and taken out,” said Tshwane health promotion supervisor for Doctors Without Borders, Sibusiso Ndlovu, who claimed several patients were turned away “based on their appearance and accent”.
– reitumetsem@citizen.co.za
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