Earlier this year, on 26th March, Statistics South Africa (StatsSA) released its first Migration Report. It needs to be acknowledged that this report is published in an environment where many myths about migration have gained the unjustified status of fact, where prejudice often trumps reliable data and research, and where, for political expediency, entire narratives about migration are twisted to provide a background supportive of politicians’ arguments.

This was particularly rife in the pre-election period and has continued to dominate the political landscape after the elections. Very recently, Mr Kunene the Deputy Leader of the Patriotic Alliance, which has nine seats in Parliament conflated several aspects of immigration and turned a simple extension of visas into a declaration that illegal foreigners stay in South Africa had been legalised. This sort of careless conflation is particularly dangerous in a febrile society.

Paper by the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference Parliamentary Liaison Office