‘Dangerous SA still beats life in Zim’

IOL News

By Peta Thornycroft

“We can’t go home. There is nothing at home,” says Tendai, 27, who prefers to be known as David in South Africa.

His is the same lament of many Zimbabweans living in South Africa – less than 1 000 took up the government’s offer of a free trip home this week after anti “foreigner” violence erupted.

“I was worried when I heard about what happened in Durban,” who works for a Mozambican tree feller.

“But there was no problem here, where I am.”

He now squats in Tembisa, east of Joburg, with a group of his countrymen.

This is a “comfortable” arrangement as they all speak Shona and help each other. “My brother is here. He came before me but he is struggling for work.

“My sister is in Harare, and she is looking for work with her husband. They are both thinking of coming to Joburg this year. I didn’t want to leave my mother as she is now alone. But I had to go.

“I will try to go home at Christmas. But I am okay here.” He sends home money every three months via runners from Park Station.

David Coltart, one of Zimbabwe’s most prominent human rights activists was “appalled” at the outbreak of xenophobic violence in South Africa.

But he said the Zimbabwean government’s criticism of South Africa last week was “breathtaking hypocrisy”.

He remembered, as a young lawyer, his first clients in 1983 were members of then opposition Zapu party lead by Joshua Nkomo, who were being detained.

“Thousands” were killed by a new brigade loyal to then prime minister Robert Mugabe, and many fled to South Africa.

He said most Zimbabweans had… “been accommodated, indeed welcomed, by both the government and people”.

Independent Foreign Service