Africa-Press – South-Africa. The Gauteng High Court in Pretoria has ordered Home Affairs Minister Aaron Motsoaledi not to arrest or issue deportation orders for Zimbabwean Exemption Permit (ZEP) holders after ruling that his decision to terminate the permits was invalid, unlawful and unconstitutional.
The court also ruled that ZEP holders must be allowed to leave or enter South Africa and may not be dealt with in terms of sections 29, 30 and 32 of the Immigration Act on the basis that they are ZEP holders.
It further ordered that the permits be valid for a further 12 months until June 2024.
In 2009, Home Affairs introduced special permits that allowed Zimbabwean nationals to live and work in South Africa. The permit was originally called the Zimbabwe Special Dispensation Permit (ZSP) and was issued after a call to any Zimbabweans in the country, whether in South Africa legally or illegally, to come forward and regularise their stay.
The ZSP expired in December 2017 and was replaced by the ZEP, which was due to expire in December 2021 after Motsoaledi decided not to renew the permit.
He then extended the expiration deadline to 30 June 2023, which he later changed to December 2023.
Last year, the Zimbabwe Immigration Federation (ZIF), a group that says it represents more than 1 000 ZEP holders, launched an application in the High Court to challenge the scrapping of the ZEP. The first and second applicants were federation director Vindiren Magadzire, who has lived in South Africa for 12 years, and the ZIF.
Their legal representative submitted that Motsoaledi relied on section 31(2)b of the Immigration Act when he decided to extend the permits.
The court found that the act does not empower the minister to make this decision. It said the act allows the minister to grant a foreigner or a group of foreigners the right of permanent residence for a specified or unspecified period.
The High Court said:
However, the court found that Motsoaledi could, in terms of section 31(2)(b)(i), exclude one or more foreigners on good cause, evidence of which the court would need to prove objectively.
The applicants’ lawyer further argued that Motsoaledi violated the permit holders’ constitutional right to dignity, life, equality, freedom and security, to which the court agreed.
It also noted that the expiration would have affected the children and spouses of permit holders, some of whom are South African nationals.
For More News And Analysis About South-Africa Follow Africa-Press
