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‘They will attack me if I stay’: immigrants in South Africa flee for safety amid violence and anti-foreigner protests

More than 2,000 anti-foreigner protesters march through Durban city centre as the arbitrary deadline passes for undocumented migrants to leave the country South Africa was holding its breath on Tuesday as mass anti-immigration protests were held across the country. They come after a weeks-long campaign against foreigners that has seen at least four killed and tens of thousands fleeing for safety. In the coastal city of Durban, where violence had been expected, the streets were unusually quiet and shops were shuttered as tension hung thick in the air. More than 2,000 protesters in Zulu attire marched through the city centre, brandishing sticks and clubs and calling out “ Abahambe! ” (“They must go!” in isiZulu, the most widely spoken language in the country), a phrase that has become the movement’s rallying cry. Weary mothers and children sat around campfires while people lifted their tightly packed belongings into buses headed for South Africa’s northern border. He turns two months old today.” Down the road, in a makeshift camp set up by families from Zimbabwe, Lydia Mpingashato had just been informed of her dismissal from her job as a cleaner. The country, which is home to about 2.4 million foreigners (documented and undocumented) according to 2022 census data , has a long history of anti-immigrant violence. In response to the latest tensions, the government has sought to ease public anger by intensifying its crackdown on undocumented immigration. Since thousands of people had fled the country in recent weeks, she said, many jobs had suddenly become available. “Life will be better now,” her friend added. “We don’t hate them, but they overstayed.” For Mukandjwa Shomri of the Southern Africa Refugee Organisations Forum , South Africa’s government “is not doing enough” to hold perpetrators of xenophobic violence accountable. “When you try to open a case with the police, they will first ask for your papers,” he said. “We are being attacked in the streets, in the community and administratively. “The hope many of us had as refugees when we came to this country – that South Africa is upholding human rights, a country affirmed internationally as a democratic state, is no longer there,” he said. The asylum seeker from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, who has been in South Africa since 2014, went into hiding after his shop was attacked on 19 June.