The recent high court ruling interdicting Operation Dudula from intimidating foreign nationals and blocking their access to health care is an important reminder that everyone living in SA is entitled to essential public services, regardless of their nationality or immigration status. It sends an important signal to xenophobic thugs that they cannot take the law into their own hands.
But while it offers immediate comfort to migrant patients and their families, it does not resolve the far bigger question of their future in SA.
SA has one of the world’s most liberal constitutions, written to right the wrongs of apartheid and ensure that everyone living within the country’s borders has equal rights. Crafted in an era when far fewer people saw SA as an appealing destination, it now poses a massive headache for a government wrestling with the demands placed on its public services created by millions of immigrants, many of them undocumented.
Much of the migrant problem is of the government’s own doing: SA’s borders are notoriously porous, officials have a reputation for being readily bribed and immigration enforcement is lax. But part of the challenge is largely out of its hands, as SA is surrounded by countries with weak economies and limited resources, making it a magnet for millions of people seeking better prospects.
The government’s failure to stem the influx of migrants has created a perfect storm, adding strain to overburdened public hospitals and schools and fuelling the rise of violent anti-immigrant sentiment. The most recent manifestation of this alarming trend is Operation Dudula, which has demanded identity documents from people seeking care at government hospitals and clinics, and barred access to those it deems undeserving. It has openly targeted people it deems “too foreign” and chased pregnant women and mothers with young children away from clinics where they are entitled to free services. All too often, law enforcement officers have turned a blind eye.
Given Operation Dudula’s threat to deploy similar tactics at public schools when they open in January, judge Leicester Adams’ ruling last week could not have been better timed. It clearly states that only police and immigration officers have the authority to demand identity documents to verify a person’s immigration status. And it puts Operation Dudula firmly in its place, restraining it from interfering with migrants’ access to public services and prohibiting it from whipping up antiforeigner sentiment.
President Cyril Ramaphosa rightly told parliament last week that regardless of South Africans’ concern about the strain illegal immigrants place on social services, the part they may play in criminal activities, or the jobs they occupy, SA is no place for vigilantism. He assured MPs that the government was intent on modernising its border management and immigration services, and that the new electronic travel authorisation system would help stamp out corruption and stem the tide of illegal migrants.
But his castigation of employers who hire undocumented migrants, who the president argues fuel the jobs crisis, fails to acknowledge that if people are barred from taking up legitimate work they cannot pay taxes and are more likely to turn to crime.
It is a perfect example of how the government’s failure to curb migration and its inability to enforce what is already on the statute books is fuelling a problem that is most acutely felt by the poor. It is not professionals who are losing out to cheap migrant labour, but relatively unskilled South Africans.
The government’s muddled thinking is evident too in the National Health Insurance Act, which seeks to roll back the healthcare rights of noncitizens by requiring illegal immigrants, asylum seekers and refugees to pay for nonemergency services. It is a short-sighted provision that risks undermining public health and is now the subject of legal challenge.
Operation Dudula and its ilk have been chastised by the court. But their vile discourse will not wane until the government finds an effective and humane way to put an end to unchecked migration.
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