Australian suffers detention ordeal over expired visa
Visitor spent five months in notorious Lindela
JOHN Pettigrew had heard a lot about South African hospitality. But he got more than he bargained for.
The 27-year-old Australian spent five months in the infamous Johannesburg repatriation facility, Lindela, after his visitor’s visa expired last year.
During his time there, he claims he was attacked by fellow inmates, assaulted by a guard, forced to sleep in a cramped room with several other inmates and held illegally despite a court order ordering his release.
He was released only after managing to marry his South African partner while still in Lindela, thereby allowing him to stay in the country. Now legally settled in the Eastern Cape, he intends taking legal action against the Department of Home Affairs.
This week, Pettigrew painted a grim picture of conditions at Lindela, which is run by a private security company on behalf of the department.
Allegations of violence and abuse at the facility have featured in several damning reports by civil society organisations in recent years.
Lindela is supposed to be a transit facility for foreign nationals awaiting deportation, but many inmates end up staying much longer than the maximum 120 days allowed by the Immigration Act.
Pettigrew said he was shocked to be transferred to the facility near Roodepoort after initially being told he was being transferred to East London to await the outcome of a court appeal against his deportation.
He was put in a communal cell with “at least 50 people”.
“The first thing you are told is that it is not a prison but a waiting zone, but it is as good as a prison,” said Pettigrew. “They treat people like animals — it is disgusting.”
He said the low point of his stay was a riot in September last year, when guards attacked inmates with pieces of hosepipe and opened fire with rubber bullets.
At one point, he was caught up in a battle that pitted Christian inmates against Muslims.
He said his problems continued even after he was moved to a separate cell. After lodging complaints about conditions and demanding a meeting with Australian embassy officials in Johannesburg, he was branded a “troublemaker”.
He said abuses at Lindela included:
They treat people like animals — it is disgusting
Corruption among prison guards, with bribes being standard procedure;
A standard R100 bribe to leapfrog to the front of the deportation queue;
Shocking facilities and food, with vegetables “boiled to a mush”. Inmates were fed only twice a day; and
Regular beatings of inmates who were “sometimes herded like cattle”.
Pettigrew said hewas assaulted by a guard after being found in possession of a spoon.
He was released in February after his lawyer, Stephen May, obtained a court order demand- ing his release.
Pettigrew fell foul of the visa regulations because he was in prison in the Eastern Cape, awaiting trial on a charge of fraud, for which his life partner — Greg Wiggill — received a suspended sentence.
Pettigrew was acquitted on the criminal charge, but he was transferred from Correctional Services to the custody of the Department of Home Affairs.
“I feel like I’ve been stuck in some kind of nightmare for the past year,” he said.
His ordeal came to an end after he was granted permission to marry in what was the first gay marriage in Lindela.
Home Affairs spokesman Mayihlome Tshwete said yesterday he intended getting details of Pettigrew’s case before formulating a proper response. He conceded that deportations sometimes took longer than necessary, due to the great number of illegal immigrants and asylum seekers.
“Our system is terribly burdened. There is a great influx into South Africa and in many cases the department doesn’t have the necessary resources. Plans are being put in place to make sure the system becomes more efficient.”
Watchdog groups have often complained about the treatment of foreign nationals by the department, particularly at Lindela, where up to 7 000 people are kept. Most of them are asylum seekers and migrants from Zimbabwe and Malawi.
The South African Human Rights Committee has issued several reports about conditions at Lindela since 1999, but its recommendations have been largely ignored.
A recent Legal Resources Centre report accused Lindela guards of assaulting inmates.