Work permit axe hangs over former refugees

Angolans who fled civil war no longer protected by law

ANGOLANS who fled their war-torn country for refuge here now face a new challenge: getting work permits to allow them to stay in the country which many of them call home after living here for over a decade.

In 2013 the government ended the refugee status related to the Angolan civil war and many Angolans were voluntarily repatriated.

However, some who had made a life here opted to stay, and applied for and received work permits valid for two years.

Fernando, from Angola, who does not want his surname used, finds himself in this predicament. He was one of thousands of Angolans who fled his country in the 1990s, arriving here in 1994 and making a life for himself in Cape Town as a cab driver.

He has two children, a daughter aged 10, and a son aged 6, who are South African citizens.

But he is not, and has an Angolan passport.

The Angolan civil war ended in 2002 and a decade later, in 2012, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees announced that refugee status for Angolans would end.

“This means people who fled and remain abroad will no longer be regarded as refugees by UNHCR and host governments,” a UNHCR spokesman said at the time.

While many of Fernando’s countrymen returned home after 2012, he and hundreds of other Angolans chose to remain in South Africa. His two-year work permit, issued in 2013, described him as an “independent contractor” for a cab company.

The work permit was relatively easy to obtain, he said. But when he tried to extend it early last month, he was asked to provide a range of supporting documentation that he didn’t have.

Fernando said he and other Angolans were unaware that they would have to satisfy a list of stringent requirements to get extensions.

“They said I need police clearance from my country, but I need to get that in Angola. How am I supposed to do that?”

VFS Global, a group that performs visa- and passport-related tasks for governments, lists some of the requirements on its website.

These include an appointment letter, a police clearance certificate, a radiological report and medical report.

More worrying for Fernando, is the fact that work permits are generally granted only if an applicant’s employer provides a letter to the Department of Labour stating that, despite a “diligent search”, it couldn’t find any South Africans with the skills to do the job.

Fernando and other Angolans work in relatively unskilled jobs and do not fall into this category.

“There are no good options for me,” he said.

Tomorrow his work permit will expire and at anytime police can ask for his documents .

While he has enough money to

A COUNTRY AT WAR

THE Angolan civil war was a protracted conflict that followed the country’s war of independence from Portugal in 1975. According to the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, it internally displaced four million Angolans and created 550 000 refugees. While most fled to the neighbouring states of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Zambia and Namibia, thousands also made their way to South Africa. They were granted refugee status, allowing them to live and work in South Africa. The war ended in 2002, following the death of Unita commander Jonas Savimbi. make a long-distance bus trip to Angola, he fears leaving his South African children behind. He is not married to either of the mothers of his children, so he cannot stay in the country as a spouse.

As the family’s breadwinner, he fears the worst if he is forced to leave his children behind.

Bernard Toyambi, the director of refugee rights group People Against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty described the situation as “very concerning”.

“Many Angolans are in South Africa on a short-term visa but that is about to expire or has already expired,” Toyambi said.

They will find themselves in contravention of the Immigration Act and risk being deported as “illegal foreigners”.

Toyambi said a solution would be for the government to grant them special permits that allowed them to remain in the country.

The UNHCR said in 2013 it recommended that countries hosting Angolan refugees should consider local integration (or alternative status) for those who had strong family and socio-economic ties to the countries.

Tina Ghelli, senior regional external relations officer at the commission, said as part of a solution for Angolan refugees in Namibia, South Africa and Zambia, it was agreed to give alternative status to those who met the criteria.

“The government of Angola is committed to giving their nationals passports to enable this to happen. At the time, the government of South Africa informed the individuals that this programme would give them a permit valid for two years only, following which they would have to apply to renew their permits just like any other foreign national in South Africa.

“UNHCR hopes that government officials will take into consideration that many of the families have lived for several decades in South Africa, have children that have grown up here and consider South Africa to be their home. Many of them do not speak Portuguese and are no longer familiar with their places of origin inside Angola.”

The Department of Home Affairs had not replied to a request for comment at publication time.

PICTURE: LEON LESTRADE IN LIMBO: Fernando from Angola, who has lived in South Africa for the past 21 years, has been unable to extend his work permit and faces deportation when it expires.