Picture: File Photo
Durban, South Africa: Authorities removed Thursday scores of foreign nationals who had sought protection from anti-migrant groups at a church centre in Durban in a days-long standoff highlighting xenophobic tensions in South Africa.
Campaigns by small citizen-led groups against undocumented migrants have picked up in recent months but without reaching the level of violence seen in waves of anti-foreigner attacks over previous years.
Police herded about 400 migrants from countries including the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, Rwanda and Somalia onto buses and removed them from the complex in the east coast city where some had been camped for days.
Local anti-immigrant campaigners cheered and chanted "They must go!" as the foreign nationals -- including women and children -- were driven to a government refugee centre.
Some pressed identity documents to bus windows to show they had the proper papers to be in South Africa.
Several told AFP they had left their homes in fear after anti-immigrant locals went door-to-door to tell undocumented foreigners to leave by June 30.
Their ultimatum has no legal weight and is not backed by the authorities.
There were some scuffles during the evacuation, with one man breaking free and chased by locals before police intervened.
Blame
Anti-immigrant figurehead Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma told reporters that her group, March and March, opposed violence but wanted all undocumented foreign nationals to leave.
The group blames migrants for social ills such as high unemployment and crime, but analysts say this is scapegoating.
Meanwhile, Ghana said Thursday it planned to evacuate more than 800 of its citizens from South Africa after a viral video showing the alleged assault of a Ghanaian man triggered outrage.
South Africa has faced recurring waves of xenophobic violence since 2008, when dozens of migrants were killed and thousands displaced.
There were similar flare-ups in 2015 and 2021, often sparked by economic frustrations and political mobilisation around anti-immigrant rhetoric.
The latest spike comes as political parties seek support ahead of local government elections in six months.
One of the migrants at the Durban centre, Robert Ikobia, told AFP he had left the DRC when he was 12 years old to escape war.
"I have the papers to be here. But every time there has been a xenophobic upheaval, I have been a victim," he said.
"In 2012 I was shot in the head and nearly died. A few years later, I was stabbed by a mob.
I fled a war in my country, yet I cannot find peace in South Africa," he said.
