SA’s tourism soars despite our visa mess

Tourist arrivals in South Africa hit a positive trend, with improvements in the number of visitors spanning 2021 to 2023 – despite the department of home affairs chasing away visitors who have not received visa renewals by 23 February.

In a directive issued by home affairs on 21 December, tourists were advised to leave the country by the end of this month, despite admitting a backlog and long turnaround time for visas.

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International Tourism Association’s Fred Duma said the backlog was now sitting at more than 95 000 applications, “which clearly means no-one will get their visa by the time the minister Aaron Motsoaledi has set”.

Duma said this seemed like a deliberate sabotage from the department, “because you have already granted this person a visa and because of your own doing you cannot extend it, despite the promising figures from Stats SA”.

“Stats SA clearly indicated an increase in visitors since Covid. At just more than eight million tourists last year, there was a notable improvement, where the total tourist arrivals were 17.1% below the pre-pandemic levels, moving from 10.2 million in 2019 to 8.4million in 2023,” he said.

Stats SA noted “the December 2023 number (862 460) remains 41.8% lower than the pre-pandemic figure (1.4 million) recorded in 2019”.

“Other African countries have shown a notable recovery by exceeding the pre-pandemic levels by 11.9%, from 38 501 tourists in 2019 to 43 093 tourists in 2023.

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“There is, however, a possibility for a complete recovery for the Southern African Development Community (Sadc) and overseas region, as overseas tourist arrivals have reached 78.5% of 2019’s levels and Sadc has reached 90.2%,”

Stats SA said. Southern Africa Tourism Services Association chair Oupa Pilane said home affairs’ irrational decree showed complete disregard for the tourism industry and “will be ruinous at a time when the country desperately needs visitors’ foreign capital”.

“South Africa grants short-term visas on arrival to tourists from many countries. But due to astounding levels of ineptitude and incompetence, home affairs regularly fails to process the simple visa extensions in a reasonable time,” he said.

“The much-needed ‘swallows’ who visit for up to 180 days are a golden goose for South Africa’s economy and, indeed, its tourism sector, which is the third-highest GDP earner for the country and enjoys a deep and vast supply chain creating job opportunities.”

Pilane said it was shameful that home affairs could not execute its simple mandate in issuing visas on time, and “then thinks nothing of imposing arbitrary edicts to eject visitors who planned six-month stays and, in many cases, own property here”.

“Tourism is trumpeted as a priority by government, yet this renegade department – and others like the department of transport – appear to be doing their utmost to shackle this critical sector, either with deliberate intent or through staggering ineptitude,” he said.

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“It is disgraceful to penalise visitors for their inexcusable dysfunction.” The DA shadow minister of home affairs Angel Khanyile said tourists, when entering South Africa, could be issued with a 90-day visa and, subsequently, apply for a 90- day extension if they wish to stay longer.

“The country stands to lose millions in lost revenue by not allowing them to extend their visas during the busiest season,” Khanyile said.

“The solution to the backlog for the department is simply to avoid dealing with it and remove the responsibility to process extensions.”

“The DA has written to the minister of home affairs to request that he issue a new directive which will provide tourist who are in our country on a 90 day visa, awaiting the outcome of their extension, to be granted the right to remain until such a time that the backlog is resolved, or on the basis of their date of departure – depending on which comes first,” she said.