By James Hall
NELSPRUIT, South Africa, Jan 20 2003 (IPS)

Sipho Mahlalela, a primary school teacher, left his home in Swaziland, where unemployment had reached 45 percent of the adult workforce, and crossed the border into neighbour South Africa, the regional economic giant.

But unemployment there stood at 29.5 percent, and while Swazis had been welcome for a century as migrant workers, Sipho had other plans.

‘’I wanted to emigrate to South Africa. When the South Africans heard that, I was no longer seen as someone who would eventually go back home to Swaziland, but as a competitor for South African jobs and social services. But I had skills required, and I am under consideration for a work permit,” he says.

Mahlalela has family in Nelspruit, and relatives throughout the Mpumalanga province where twice as many Swazis (defined as members of the Swazi ethnic group) reside than in the tiny country of Swaziland itself.

The teacher’s story will probably end happily for him. His value to the South African economy, which faces a teacher’s shortage due to AIDS and emigration, is recognised. He has been assured of a work permit, and this year (2003) he will resettle his family to his new home.

Another Swazi in Mpumalanga province, nurse Dorothea Msibi, has a contrasting story of frustration and broken promises. ‘’I have been working at a government hospital since 2000, but they have not issued a permanent residence permit that they promised me. I studied in South Africa. I have family here. The insecurity of not having a permanent residence permit, which I will use as a step toward South African citizenship, has caused me problems. I have been passed over for promotion because of my situation,” she claims.

She does not know if it is just a matter of a slow-working bureaucracy, or whether she might one day be deported. ‘’Sometimes I think that the authorities want to be sure that every South African who ever wanted to be a nurse has a job before they will give me my permit,” she says.

Six years have passed since the Ministry of Home Affairs issued a report that stated, ‘’Immigration can be viewed as being in the national interest and a potential aid rather than an impediment to nation-building.” But immigrants still face obstacles in their efforts to improve their own lives through opportunities in South Africa, and by adding their talents to their adopted country helping to fuel the growth of Africa’s most developed economy.

‘’All immigrants have unsettled lives, because they must replace past lives with new ones in unknown locations. But immigrants to South Africa face an attitude of ambiguity from authorities who wish to welcome them on one hand, but warily put up restrictions on the other hand,” an aid worker with the refugee organisation CARITAS says.

A government study on immigration policy recommended, ‘’Instead of letting whites in and keeping blacks out as candidates for naturalisation, as was apartheid’s want, we should admit individuals who have desirable skills, expertise, resources and entrepreneurial will. Economic development will undoubtedly be boosted.”

South African embassies abroad are publicising their country’s desire for skilled immigrants. The Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) may wish to put a lid on immigration to protect the jobs of its union membership, but the professionals and entrepreneurs sought by government are usually non-union managers, trade people and professionals in medical and other fields.

But what of unskilled Africans seeking entry into South Africa, and eventual citizenship? Training and education opportunities are inferior to South Africa’s among all other 14-member states of the South African Development Community (SADC).

‘’I taught myself to be an auto mechanic,” says Martin Mosisili of Lesotho. A parentless child who was raised in a Catholic orphanage in the capital Maseru, Mosisili had no family or job prospects to tie him to the land of his birth, and he emigrated to South Africa in 1996.

‘’I have worked for a bus company and a taxi company in Jo’burg (Johannesburg), but there was always some problem with work permits. I want to get married and have a home. It is hard to get a permit because there are too many mechanics,” he says.

To government, Mosisili does not possess priority skills. Immigration authorities would prefer young Lesotho men as migrant workers who send their earnings back to families at home.

A Department of Home Affairs white paper reported, ‘’South Africans have a vested interest in ensuring that the economies of the other SADC states become vibrant and strong, not least because development in these countries result in local job creation and thereby dampen the pressures for migration to South Africa. South Africa, as the regionally dominant power, can and should actively assist in the economic development and reconstruction of the region.”

One way to accomplish this is through ‘’migrants with access to the South African labour market who remit considerable amounts home to invest in local economies. These flows can help to stabilise those economies and dampen the pressure for outward migration. However, legal access to the South African labour market is currently limited to young male migrants in the mining industry and commercial farms, while women and SADC citizens with other skills useful to South Africa tend to be excluded”.

About 50 percent of South Africa’s miners are migrants, perpetuating an historic trend begun in the 19th century of Africans from other nations seeking employment in the mines. During the apartheid era, they were never permitted to become South African citizens.

Miners from Mozambique and Lesotho are subject to the Compulsory Deferred Pay (CDP) system, which sends a portion of their wages to banks in their native countries. The system is opposed by the National Union of Mineworkers. The CDP benefits the governments of Lesotho and Mozambique through repatriated wages. Those governments argue that their citizens in South African mines are migrants, not immigrants with intentions to settle in South Africa.

‘’That is not true for me and for others I know,” counters Simeo Monteiro from Maputo, Mozambique. ‘’If I could save my money here I could establish myself (in preparation for citizenship). But most of my wages are sent to Mozambique.”

White Europeans have historically had no difficulty being assimilated into society. In 1939, James Eshelby arrived with his father as Jewish exiles from Germany. The father and son established a piano tuning business that is now in its third generation.

James’ son Deon has moved the business from downtown Johannesburg to a game park near Pretoria, the capital of South Africa. ‘’We are truly a part of South Africa. There is no question in my mind that this is still a desirable country to live in. There are investment opportunities, and people with skills are needed and should have an easy time of it.”

Immigration continues to expand the Eshelby family. Deon’s cousin will soon wed an interior designer who arrived from Denmark.

The Department of Labour estimates that there are five million illegal aliens in South Africa, a nation with a population of 47 million. No satisfying answer to the problem has been formulated.

A tide of unskilled illegal immigrants continues to cross the border from poorer neighbour countries, while skilled foreign workers are seen by labour unions and workers as unfair competition to be blocked.

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