Detention center for undocumented migrants in South Africa
The Lindela Repatriation Centre is a detention centre for undocumented migrants in South Africa.[1] The Lindela Repatriation Centre (Lindela) is one of South Africa's largest facilities for the holding of undocumented migrants. These people are all awaiting determination of their legal status in South Africa (or deportation). Due to an ever increasing burden on SAPS holding cells and the lack of detention capacity in the country's prisons, the need for a repatriation centre in Gauteng was identified by the Department of Home Affairs. In 1996, Lindela was opened to meet this requirement. It claims to be compliant with all good governance and lawful criteria.
The Department of Home Affairs is legally and administratively responsible for all matters pertaining to the apprehension, holding, processing, repatriation and release of illegal aliens at the Lindela repatriation centre.
In March[7] and June[8] 2012 there were riots at the centre. Various reports critical of abuses of human rights at the centre have been ignored.[9]
In September 2014 following two complaints by the Medecins Sans Frontieres or Doctors without Borders, Section 27, and People Against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty; the South African Human Rights Commission released a report identifying certain healthcare and legal issues at Lindela.[10] The South African Parliament then formed a Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs to look into the allegations and was given 3 months to report back to parliament. In October 2014, detainees stopped a hunger strike after they claimed guards attacked them using rubber bullets and batons.[11] On 20 October 2014, the South African Minister of Home AffairsMalusi Gigaba, did an inspection along with the media of the Lindela Repatriation Centre after human rights abuse allegations surfaced in the media.[12] The minister also invited the South African Human Rights Commission to establish an office at the centre so that Human Rights can be monitored on a daily basis.[13] To date the SAHRC have not taken up the offer.[14]
The ANC Women's League has shares in the centre.[15]
Villawood Immigration Detention Centre, originally Villawood Migrant Hostel or Villawood Migrant Centre, split into a separate section named Westbridge Migrant Hostel from 1968 to 1984, is an Australian immigration detention facility located in the suburb of Villawood in Sydney, Australia.
Cato Manor is a working-class area located 7 kilometres (4.3 mi) from the city centre of Durban, South Africa.
Abahlali baseMjondolo is a socialist shack dwellers' movement in South Africa which primarily campaigns for land, housing and dignity, to democratise society from below and against xenophobia.
The "Third Force" was a term used by leaders of the ANC during the late 1980s and early 1990s to refer to a clandestine force believed to be responsible for a surge in violence in KwaZulu-Natal, and townships around and south of the Witwatersrand.
Prior to 1994, immigrants from elsewhere faced discrimination and even violence in South Africa due competition for scarce economic opportunities. After majority rule in 1994, contrary to expectations, the incidence of xenophobia increased. Between 2000 and March 2008, at least 7 people died in what were identified as xenophobic attacks. In May 2008, a series of attacks left 12 people dead; although 10 of those killed were South African citizens. The attacks were partly motivated by xenophobia. In 2015, another nationwide spike in xenophobic attacks against immigrants in general prompted a number of foreign governments to begin repatriating their citizens. A Pew Research poll conducted in 2018 showed that 62% of South Africans viewed immigrants as a burden on society by taking jobs and social benefits and that 61% of South Africans thought that immigrants were more responsible for crime than other groups. Based on various police reports 60% of suspects arrested for violent crimes in Gauteng South Africa are illegal immigrants, between 2015 - 2016. The number of foreign nationals who have been arrested by the Johannesburg Metropolitan Police Department (JMPD) between 2016 and 2019 sit at 7841. Between 2010 and 2017 the illegal immigrant community in South Africa increased from 2 million people to 4 million people. The proportion of South Africa's total population that is foreign born increased from 2.8% in 2005 to 7% in 2019, according to the United Nations International Organization for Migration, in spite of widespread xenophobia in the country. This made South Africa the largest recipient of immigrants on the African continent in 2019.
People Against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty (PASSOP) is a community-based, grass roots non-profit organisation fighting for the rights of asylum seekers, refugees and immigrants in Cape Town, South Africa.
The Landless People's Movement is an independent social movement in South Africa. It consisted of rural people and people living in shack settlements in cities. The Landless People's Movement boycotted parliamentary elections and had a history of conflict with the African National Congress. The Landless People's Movement was affiliated to Via Campesina internationally and its Johannesburg branches to the Poor People's Alliance in South Africa.
eMacambini is a rural area in the KwaZulu-Natal province of South Africa which is mostly populated by members of the Macambini clan. It is near Mandeni on the Zululand coast, just north of Durban and close to the new King Shaka International Airport.
No Land! No House! No Vote! is the name of a campaign by a number of poor people's movements in South Africa that calls for the boycotting of the vote and a general rejection of party politics and vote banking. The name is meant to imply that if government does not deliver on issues important to affected communities these movements will not vote.
The United States government holds tens of thousands of immigrants in detention under the control of Customs and Border Protection and the Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). Immigrants are detained for unlawful entry to the United States, when their claims for asylum are received, and in the process of deportation and removal from the country. During Fiscal Year 2018, 396,448 people were booked into ICE custody: 242,778 of whom were detained by CBP and 153,670 by ICE's own enforcement operations. A daily average of 42,188 immigrants were held by ICE in that year. In addition, over twelve thousand immigrant children are housed by facilities under the supervision of the Office of Refugee Resettlement's program for Unaccompanied Alien Children. Prior to referral to these other agencies, the CBP holds immigrants at processing centers; between mid-May and mid-June 2019, it held between 14,000 and 18,000 immigrants.
Michael Sutcliffe is the former municipal manager of the eThekwini Metropolitan Municipality, which includes the city of Durban, South Africa. During his time in the position he was widely reported to be a controversial figure amongst Durbanites and was the target of popular protest in the city.
The Constitution of South Africa protects all basic political freedoms. However, there have been many incidents of political repression, dating back to at least 2002, as well as threats of future repression in violation of this constitution leading some analysts, civil society organisations and popular movements to conclude that there is a new climate of political repression or a decline in political tolerance.
There have been a number of political assassinations in post-apartheid South Africa. In 2013 it was reported that there had been more than 450 political assassinations in the province of KwaZulu-Natal since the end of apartheid in 1994. In July 2013 the Daily Maverick reported that there had been "59 political murders in the last five years". In August 2016 it was reported that there had been at least twenty political assassinations in the run up to the local government elections on the 3rd of August that year, most of them in KwaZulu-Natal.
In March 2013 around a thousand people occupied a piece of land in Cato Crest, Durban and named it Marikana after the Marikana miners' strike. Mayor James Nxumalo blamed the occupation on migrants from the Eastern Cape. He was strongly criticised for this by the shack dwellers' movement Abahlali baseMjondolo who said that "The City Hall is red with blood".
The May 2008 South African riots was a wave of xenophobic riots starting in Alexandra, Gauteng on 12 May 2008 and then spreading to other locations across South Africa. The violence started when South African residents of Alexandra attacked migrants from Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe, killing two people and injuring 40 others. Some attackers were reported to have been singing Jacob Zuma's campaign song Umshini Wami.
Nokuthula Mabaso, was a prominent leader in Abahlali baseMjondolo and one of the leaders of its women's league. She was a leader in the eKhenana Commune. She was assassinated on 5 May 2022.
Ayanda Ngila (1992–2022), was a land activist, a prominent leader in the shack dweller's movement Abahlali baseMjondolo and deputy chairperson of its eKhenana Commune. He was assassinated on 8 March 2022.
The eKhenana Commune is a prominent land occupation in the historic working-class area of Cato Manor in Durban, South Africa. According to the Socio-Economic Rights Institute "The eKhenana settlement is organised as a cooperative in which residents collectively run a communal kitchen and tuck shop, theatre, poetry and music projects, and care for a vegetable garden named after the late Nkululeko Gwala [assassinated in 2013] as well as a poultry farm named in honour of the late S’fiso Ngcobo [assassinated in 2018]. The Commune has solar power and is also home to a political school that residents named the Frantz Fanon School, as well as the Thuli Ndlovu Community Hall [Ndlovu was assassinated in 2014]. The Commune has suffered sustained political repression, including multiple arrests and three assassinations in 2022.
Lindokuhle Mnguni was a land activist and a prominent leader in the shack dwellers' movement Abahlali baseMjondolo. He was chairperson of the movement's youth league as well as the chairperson of the eKhenana Commune. He was a leader of eKhenana's food sovereignty project which sought to make the commune more self-sustaining and independent. He was assassinated on 8 August 2022.
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