shelter or health care, and the authorities consistently blocked efforts by NGOs to provide
assistance.27
In March 2009, when the cholera was not yet entirely under control, the DHA ordered
everyone to leave the camp, without providing any alternative plan for accommodating or
transporting people. The camp was hastily dismantled and people were bussed to
Johannesburg, allegedly by the UNHCR, who were asked by the Musina Municipality to
provide transport.28 In Johannesburg, people were offloaded to fend entirely for themselves.
MSF was appalled at the action, fearing that it could displace the epidemic around the country,
and push Zimbabweans still in Musina into hiding and out of the reach of medical care.
Furthermore, this displacement simply created new problems in Johannesburg, particularly
for the CMM, which overnight found itself filled to more than capacity, with 3,500 in the
church, and up to 2,000 additional Zimbabweans sleeping outside the church.29
The inconvenient problem of thousands of Zimbabweans cannot be solved by shifting them
from one location to another, and the current desire by some in government to throw out the
Zimbabweans living in the CMM shows that no lessons have been learnt from the Musina
experience; Zimbabwean migrants are not going to disappear into thin air as a result of being
continually chased from one place to another.
3.
Legal necessity for a policy
The barriers to coherent policy towards migrants notwithstanding, South Africa nonetheless
has a legal and moral obligation to develop such a policy, particularly if further outbreaks of
xenophobia are to be prevented. As the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC)
reminds the government in its recent report on the xenophobic violence of 2008, the
Constitution is the supreme law in South Africa: the Constitution recognizes that South Africa
“ ‘belongs to all who live in it’ ”, not just its citizens, and ‘all people’ have the right to life,
freedom and security of person, freedom from discrimination on any grounds, and freedom
from arbitrary eviction or deprivation of property”.30 These constitutional rights override all
other legal instruments in relation to migrants, whether regular or irregular, including the
2002 Immigration Act.
South Africa has a “legal and moral responsibility to defend the fundamental rights of non
nationals, to ensure justice for nonnationals and to combat the culture of impunity under which
their rights are violated”.31 Furthermore, in terms of the Constitution, “all people” have basic
socioeconomic rights, including the right to basic health care, basic education, adequate
housing, sufficient food and water, and social security.32
In spite of the legal requirement to provide health care and education for all migrants, the
government has failed to evaluate which clinics are under additional pressure from
Zimbabweans, such as in inner city Johannesburg and in Musina; no policy to provide such
27 Op cit.
28 Kenichi Serino: “UNHCR has created refugee 'crisis' in Joburg: Government”, in The Citizen, 12 March 2009.
29 Issues surrounding events at the CMM are dealt with ahead in this report.
30 SAHRC; Report on the SAHRC investigation into issues of the rule of law, justice and impunity arising out of the
public violence against nonnationals; March 2010: page 8.
31 Op cit, page 9.
32 T Polzer, ibid, page 12.
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