JOHANNESBURG, 28 October 2025– South Africa is intensifying efforts to deport undocumented migrants, as the government seeks to ease pressure on a struggling economy and rising social tensions between foreign nationals and citizens.
Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber said the country had deported 51,000 people in the past year, a figure he noted was higher than the total deportations in France and Germany combined.
“If we had more resources, we’d be doing more of that,” Schreiber told Bloomberg Television, describing South Africa as “a neglected part of the global migration story.” He warned that competition for limited employment had become “a real tinderbox.”
With the unemployment rate at 33.2%, one of the highest in the world, frustration among jobless South Africans remains intense. Around 8.4 million people are reportedly seeking work without success.
The country’s industrialised economy continues to draw workers from neighbouring states including Zimbabwe and Mozambique, but this movement has also fuelled resentment. In 2008, at least 60 people were killed and 50,000 displaced during xenophobic violence. Similar unrest erupted in 2015 and 2019, leading President Cyril Ramaphosa to apologise to other African nations after their citizens were attacked.
Recent local media reports suggest tensions continue, with some foreign nationals allegedly being prevented from accessing healthcare services by local residents.
Schreiber, a member of the Democratic Alliance (DA), the second-largest party in the coalition government, said the deportation campaign is grounded in legal principles. “We’re anchoring what we do in the rule of law to make sure that we also protect social cohesion, even as we enhance enforcement operations,” he said.
A government of national unity was formed in June 2024 after the African National Congress (ANC) failed to secure a majority for the first time since the end of apartheid in 1994. Despite policy disagreements between the ANC and DA, Schreiber said the coalition was “in a better space now” and that future disputes should be resolved “in a less public and destructive way.”
