The cholera scare in Musina comes in the wake of widespread discomfort amongst international role players about South Africa’s treatment of the thousands of asylum seekers who cross the Limpopo informally and seek refuge in Musina, Louis Trichardt and further inland. South Africa remains reluctant to recognize them as bona fide refugees and, in the process, causes widespread misery.

A recent report by Human Rights Watch says Zimbabweans in South Africa do not get the protection to which they are entitled under South African and international law. Millions of Rands are wasted on the totally ineffective and highly contentious continued deporting of all undocumented Zimbabweans, a practice which is inadvertently kindling xenophobic attitudes and is beginning to earn South Africa an international reputation of a morally and ethically delinquent country.

The report states that the Zimbabweans are not voluntary migrants but are forced out of their country for survival purposes.: “The South African Government has a stark choice: It can continue to ignore the reality of the presence of thousands of undocumented Zimbabweans, allowing many to be mistreated by police, abused by employers and haphazardly, expen-sively and ineffectively removed, or it can choose to regularize their stay”. A special permit, which will grant them the right to work in South Africa and bring an end to random deportations, is sug-gested. The Minister of Home affairs is empowered to declare Zimbabweans as refugees and regulate their presence here in such a manner. 

All major international agencies (Red Cross, Save the Children, UNHCHR and IOM) have already established offices and well-stocked supply stores in Musina. They are anxiously waiting for the minister to decide that the situation is indeed a crisis and that their assistance is needed.