March and March members shut down the Home Affairs Refugee Reception Centre on Che Guevara Road in Durban on Tuesday, disrupting access to asylum services as undocumented migrants arrived to apply for refugee status.
The anti-illegal migrant group gathered outside the centre, where women clutching documents, mothers with children and men had been queuing in the scorching Durban heat in the hope of entering the asylum system.
At 29°C, the heat hung heavily over the pavement as scores of people waited for assistance, with women and children forming one long line stretching down the road while men waited on the opposite side of the centre.
The shutdown came as Home Affairs implements a directive instructing Refugee Reception Offices to receive people who report in person and indicate that they want to apply for asylum.
The directive follows a Constitutional Court judgment in July which confirmed that provisions of the Refugees Act creating barriers for people who entered SA irregularly or failed to apply within prescribed timeframes were unconstitutional and invalid.
Among those affected by the uncertainty surrounding the asylum process is 19-year-old Congolese woman Julienne, who arrived in SA in 2025 after fleeing a country where war continues to threaten lives.
She said she had hoped to find safety in SA but instead encountered xenophobia and struggled to secure work without documentation.
“I’m here because I don’t have papers. I’m Congolese. I came to SA in 2025. I experienced a lot of xenophobia. They chased us away from work and told us that we should go home,” Julienne told IOL.
Her words capture the difficult reality facing people who arrive in SA seeking protection, only to find themselves navigating hostility, uncertainty and a lengthy asylum process.
For Julienne, returning home is not a simple option.
“But at home, there is a war there. We came here seeking safety only to find another kind of danger,” she said.
Before arriving at the Refugee Reception Centre, Julienne tried to make a living in SA.
She worked as a shop teller and also used her skills to make clothes for people. But without documentation, finding stability has remained difficult.
Now, she is among hundreds of people seeking an opportunity to enter the asylum system, with the reopening of access to new applications offering a potential lifeline to people who have struggled to obtain legal protection.
Yet the wait remains long.
“The line here is still very long. They are still assisting people who came here yesterday,” Julienne said.
March and March questions asylum changes
March and March leader Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma has strongly criticised the reopening of access to the asylum system, questioning what it could mean for SA’s already strained crime and employment landscape.
“Do you guys know that so-called refugees and asylum seekers don’t need any type of police clearance from their country?” Ngobese-Zuma said.
She alleged that the change could be exploited by people seeking to enter SA under false pretences.
“A murderer, killer, rapist can now wake up in the morning and say, ‘I’m going to SA’, and we will let them in and say, ‘Go and apply for asylum. While you wait, stay and do whatever you want in the country’,” she said.
Ngobese-Zuma further alleged that some migrants were encouraging relatives and others to travel to SA to claim asylum.
“They have started calling their brothers, cousins and family members from their countries who are criminals and some who are unemployed, telling them to drop everything and come to SA and claim to be refugees and asylum seekers,” she said.
She also criticised the Constitutional Court’s ruling and questioned its implications for SA.
“The entire Constitutional Court of the country deemed the Refugee Act more important than the Immigration Act. A country with a high crime rate and high unemployment rate has just opened up the floodgates and basically invited foreigners to be allowed to enter illegally and claim to be refugees in the country,” Ngobese-Zuma said.
Political analyst Zweli Ndevu said while people had a constitutional right to protest and express dissatisfaction with government services, that right should not interfere with other people’s rights.
“I think people have a right to protest and people have a right to voice their dissatisfaction with how services are delivered by government. So it is a constitutional right that is entrenched in the Constitution, and people have a right to exercise that,” Ndevu said.
“But once that right infringes on other people’s right to get services, then it becomes a problem. That’s where you want government to intervene, to be able to protect those who are vulnerable, those whose rights are infringed,” he said.
IOL
