Pay is within the range of the regulation minimum wage per hour and per week for the vast
majority of these workers. The stipulated minimum weekly wage is R284.
Nobody reports earning less than R199 per week.
5% reported earning R200 – 299 per week, which is at the bottom end of the
regulatory minimum wage.
86% reports earning between R300‐399 per week, which is above minimum wage
7% reports earning between R400‐499 per week
2% earn more than this.
Many of the Zimbabweans have been based in South Africa for considerable lengths of time.
Only 13% have been in South Africa for six months or less, with a further 19% in the
country for up to one year.
25% have been in the country for up to two years
43% have been in the country for between two and up to five years.
c.
Murambatsvina victims
An astonishing 52% of those interviewed report that they were displaced by Operation
Murambatsvina, the Zimbabwean government’s orchestrated demolitions that displaced an
estimated 500,000 mainly urban residents in 2005. This could be a contributing reason for so
many of this group having been in South Africa for several years, and serves to underline the
fact that the demolitions did not achieve their stated aim of shifting Zimbabweans out of the
cities and into rural Zimbabwe – they shifted many of them out of Zimbabwe altogether. There
have been many other pressures on Zimbabweans to migrate in the last five years, not least
the violence and economic collapse of 2008, but the demolitions have undoubtedly played a
large role with this group of migrants at least.113
While full employment histories of this group were not recorded, it would be interesting to
know how respondents heard that there were jobs in De Doorns. One indicator that those
interviewed had come with intent to De Doorns, and had known clearly that this was their
destination, was the fact that 94% reported that it had taken a week or less to travel from
Zimbabwe to De Doorns.
4.
Where to next?
Out of those interviewed, 11% consider that De Doorns is a permanent destination, while
another 10% think that they will stay there for at least a year. 53% think that they will move
on after being there for six months – once the picking season ends, while 15% are uncertain
as to what they will do next. 4% intend to move on almost immediately.
In short 90% of those interviewed consider themselves to have no long term, even if
temporary, home in South Africa ‐ while the 10% that intend to stay in De Doorns are living in
tents on a playing field! The interviewers referred to the desperation and depression of many
of those interviewed.
113 SPT will bring out a report later in 2010 assessing the impact of Operation Murambatsvina five years on, and
the De Doorns displaced will be researched further to gain more insight into their life events over the last five
years.
46
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