Andrew Stegmann

Six Big South African Visa Changes Announced

Change is coming. For those of you travelling to South Africa in the near future, Malusi Gigaba just made your life a little easier.

For many visitors, travelling to South Africa begins with a mountain of paperwork and laborious visits to government institutions. However, the visa processes have now been relaxed significantly, as Home Affairs Minister Malusi Gigaba revealed some huge changes on Tuesday morning.

In fact, a total of 19 countries have seen a visa requirement waived altogether. Meanwhile, tourists coming from China and India can now do all their applications remotely. These aren’t the only alterations Gigaba revealed at his media briefing, though:

E-visas are coming
If you need to catch up with what an e-visa is, you can read about it here. It’s literally an electronic form of your visa paperwork. South Africa is looking to pilot this scheme with travellers to and from New Zealand, from Autumn 2019.

E-gates are also being introduced to both Cape Town and Lanseria Airports respectively. This is where you simply scan your passport and look into a camera, allowing you to progress through border control without having to wait in long queues or face any human interaction.

Long-term multiple entry visas
Gigaba’s plans aren’t just about enticing new visitors to South Africa each year. They are firmly focused on keeping the returning tourists – the regulars, shall we say – happy with Mzansi.

That’s why there will be a roll-out of three long-term visas for travellers from certain areas. South Africa is earning its spot at the Brics table, by offering residents of Brazil, Russia, India and China a 10-year multiple entry visa.

Meanwhile, a 10-year visitor visa for academics and business-people from Africa is also in the pipeline. Not coming here in an official capacity? Then you’re still catered for, thanks to the new three-year multiple entry visa that will be offered to frequent travellers who come to our shores.

Visa applications have been made much easier for Chinese and Indian tourists
Staying with the theme of keeping our Brics partners happy, travelling to South Africa just got a whole lot easier for our Chinese and Indian visitors. Starting from next month, these changes will come into effect:

  • Visa applications for South Africa can now be done via courier, rather than in person.
  • Biometrics will only be taken on arrival in SA.
  • Five-year multiple entry visas will also be offered.

Critical skills update
By April 2019, Home Affairs will look to have a revised critical skills list for foreigners. They are likely to add more fields of employment to the list, opening the doors for a wider range of skilled and valuable migrant workers.

Interestingly, foreign students who graduate from South African university courses related to the critical skills shortlist will be offered the chance to apply for permanent residency, upon completion of their course.

Visa waiver agreements
A total of 19 countries are in line to be granted visa-free travel to South Africa, following the proposals delivered by Malusi Gigaba. It looks as if the doors have been thrown open for Gulf State nations – something we’re sure will keep a certain Jacob Zuma very happy.

Africa: Algeria, Egypt, Morocco, Sao Tome and Principe, Tunisia, Ghana, The Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (Western Saharans).

Middle-East: Saudi Arabia, UAE, Qatar, Palestine, Iran, Lebannon, Bahrain, Oman and Kuwait.

Europe: Belarus, Georgia.

North America: Cuba.

Minors
Finally, the department is keen to make things a lot smoother for minors travelling to South Africa. Malusi Gigaba announced that there will be less “rigidity” when it comes to this policy:

“We are simplifying the rules on travelling minors who are foreign nationals to minimize disruption to legitimate travellers without compromising the safety of minors and the rights of their parents.”

“Immigration officials will only insist on documentation by exception, in high-risk situations, rather than for all travellers, in line with practice by several other countries. Rather than denying entry where documentation is absent, travellers will be given an opportunity to prove parental consent.”

 

For information as to how Relocation Africa can help you with your Mobility, Immigration, Research, Remuneration, and Expat Tax needs, email marketing@relocationafrica.com, or call us on +27 21 763 4240.

Sources: Tom Head via The South African [1], [2]. Image sources: [1], [2].

Andrew Stegmann
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We Will Be Attending WERC’s 2018 Global Workforce Symposium in Seattle

Worldwide ERC will be hosting its 2018 Global Workforce Symposium in Seattle, USA, and our Director, Rene Stegmann, will be representing Relocation Africa throughout the event.

The Symposium is an annual event, and will be taking place at the Washington State Convention Center from 17 to 19 October.

The international mobility community will be gathering for three days to share distinct global perspectives, network, benchmark, collaborate, reconnect with industry peers, and build mobility solutions for today and the future.

The event will host a number of sessions, including those relating to Government Affairs Immigration; Regulations and Compliance; Global Compensation Collection; Corporate Benchmarking; GDPR; Global Mobility; Diversity; Housing Trends; and AI in the Mobility Space. For a full list of sessions, click here.

Click here to view the list of sponsors and here for the list of exhibitors. Attendance is free for first-time corporate attendees. To register go to: https://www.worldwideerc.org/events-directory/gws/home.

To arrange a meeting with Rene Stegmann, click the link here: https://calendly.com/relocationafrica-18/denverseattle2018/10-10-2018.

For information as to how Relocation Africa can help you with your Mobility, Immigration, Research, Remuneration, and Expat Tax needs, email marketing@relocationafrica.com, or call us on +27 21 763 4240.

Sources: WERC [1], [2]. Image sources: Oakie via Unsplash [1], [2].

Andrew Stegmann

Home Affairs Responds to Service Downtime

The Department of Home Affairs is adamant that the fact its services were down across the country earlier this month was out of its control.

Speaking during an interview on SAfm‚ acting director-general Thulani Mavuso said there was nothing wrong with their systems – but that power failure at the site where the server is hosted was at the heart of the problem.

“We need Sita (State Information Technology Agency) to start up on their side‚ so that when they get the power our systems can be powered up. That’s the only thing‚” Mavuso said.

“It’s not a question of whether the Home Affairs systems are broken or the application is faulty. Nothing is faulty about that.”

He said he was waiting for a technical report to be handed over‚ which would hopefully indicate when services would be fully restored. He would also be conducting an oversight visit to the Sita site.

Earlier this month, the government tweeted that the failure was due to a massive power supply outage at Sita.

@GovernmentZA tweeted: “Department of Home Affairs is experiencing system downtime due to power supply outage at SITA which has affected all offices across the country. Offices are unable to render all services. All Birth‚ Marriages‚ Death‚ Smart ID and Passport services are affected.”

It added: “SITA and the Department of Home Affairs technicians are investigating the problem‚ and clients will be updated on when services will be restored. Home Affairs apologises for the inconvenience caused to all its clients.”

Mavuso said Home Affairs had wanted to move away from Sita for the last couple of years.

“Let’s host our system in a different environment‚ because these outages and infrastructure maintenance has always been a challenge to us.”

 

For information as to how Relocation Africa can help you with your Mobility, Immigration, Research, Remuneration, and Expat Tax needs, email marketing@relocationafrica.com, or call us on +27 21 763 4240.

Sources: Nico Gous via Times Live [1], [2]. Image sources: [1], [2].

Andrew Stegmann

MPs Challenge Home Affairs on Still Unopened Refugee Centers

Parliament’s watchdog on home affairs is seeking answers as to why the department has not opened its two refugee reception offices.
On Tuesday, MPs grilled the department on the refugee reception office and why they had failed to open the offices in Cape Town and Port Elizabeth. This was despite a court ruling to open refugee centres.

“Once public works hands over the tender installation, then we as home affairs can come in and do our installation of equipment and furniture, this process will take eight weeks to do,” acting director-general at home affairs, Thulani Mavuso, said.

The department has constantly maintained it was waiting on the Department of Public Works to provide suitable office accommodation.

MPs gave home affairs officials a grilling on what progress the department had made so far.

Advocacy groups Sonke Gender Justice and The Scalabrini Centre have recently decided to bring forward contempt of court proceedings against the Department of Home Affairs.

The Supreme Court of Appeal (SCA) found the department’s decision to close the refugee reception office to new applications for asylum unlawful and irrational, and ordered the department to reopen and maintain a fully functional office in the Cape Town metropolitan area by March 31.

It further ordered the department provide monthly reports on its progress in complying with the order.

The Nbaya case, launched in 2015 through the Legal Resource Centre on behalf of asylum seekers, relates to the renewal of the permits of asylum seekers at the refugee reception office.

This should happen even if they lodged their applications at other refugee reception offices around the country.

In this case, the Western Cape High Court found that the department’s policy of refusing to renew asylum permits from other offices was unlawful and ordered it to renew the permits of asylum seekers residing in Cape Town or to be informed of any decision relating to his or her application through the Cape Town refugee reception office.

“We never had a problem supplying monthly reports, we have concluded a discussion with the two groups to supply a report this week,” Mavuso said.

Portfolio manager of Public Works Reggie Ncobo said: “We have commenced with the procurement process, there were two options explored as a procurement model which the regional office has identified as state owned property in Maitland.

“The idea is for permanent and interim and thereafter we will be advertising a tender process.”

The department said the refugee centres would be opened next year.

 

For information as to how Relocation Africa can help you with your Mobility, Immigration, Research, Remuneration, and Expat Tax needs, email marketing@relocationafrica.com, or call us on +27 21 763 4240.

Sources: Marvin Charles via IOL [1], [2]. Image sources: [1], [2].