They want the Zimbabwean government to help them get home safely
Hundreds of Zimbabwean nationals are sleeping outside the Zimbabwean consulate in Cape Town pleading for the government to help them get back home.
On Thursday 18 June, piles of large suitcases and bags wrapped in plastic were strewn on the pavements around the office. People were huddled in groups with blankets and jackets to keep warm. The previous night the group, including women and children, had slept outside.
“I want to go to Zimbabwe because of xenophobia,” said Marian Gwanyira who had been living in Dunoon. While holding her six-month-old baby, she said she had been threatened by her neighbours. They told her “Abahambe” which means “They must leave”.
She came to South Africa in 2024 with her husband because “in Zimbabwe there’s no jobs”, she said.
Gwanyira faced another night on the pavement with her baby and husband again.
“I don’t want to be undocumented,” said Spray Vandai, who has lived in Gugulethu for four years.
Vandai, who is from Harare, said he has gone to the Department of Home Affairs several times to get his expired asylum papers reinstated. But he was turned away each time.
He said about 300 people had come to the consulate in the last 24 hours, pleading for the Zimbabwean government to help repatriate them. They fear violence as the 30 June March and March self proclaimed deadline looms.
Vandai has been helping to write down the names and details of those trying to leave. He said people had arrived from all over the Western Cape, including Bredasdorp, Hermanus, Mfuleni and Khayelitsha.
Vandai said he is leaving because he no longer has a job. “Most people are getting fired now because they don’t have the right documentation,” he said.
Foreign nationals across South Africa have been taking up voluntary repatriation due to anti-immigrant violence led by the xenophobic March and March movement founded by Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma.
In Durban, thousands of immigrants have been camping outside Sherwood Hall. Hundreds of Nigerians have boarded flights from Johannesburg and hundreds of Malawians have fled the Overberg region in the Western Cape.
Rangano John Chamisa, who took a bus to the Consulate from Bredasdorp early on Thursday 18 June, said he is terrified of xenophobic violence.
Chamisa said if a bus didn’t arrive for them, he would have no choice but to spend another night in the cold.
Attempts to contact the Zimbabwean consulate were unsuccessful. ~ GroundUp