South African Department of Home Affairs
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Logo of the department
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| Department overview | |
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| Formed | 31 May 1910 |
| Jurisdiction | Government of South Africa |
| Headquarters | Hallmark Building, Corner of Johannes Ramokhoase & Thabo Sehume Street, Pretoria 25°43′18″S 28°18′39″E / 25.72167°S 28.31083°E |
| Employees | 9,375 (2009) |
| Annual budget | R5,719.6 million (2010/11) |
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| Department executive |
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| Website | www.home-affairs.gov.za |
The Department of Home Affairs is a department of the South African government. Malusi Gigaba is the current Minister of Home Affairs.
The department is responsible for:
In the 2010 national budget, the department received an appropriation of 5,719.6 million rand, and had 9,375 employees.
The department has been criticized for its inefficiency, particularly in regard to processing documents. Eye Witness News reported that it will take two years to process visa requests from Zimbabwe citizens applying for work and study permits.
In another case, The Sowetan reports that as South African citizen has unsuccessfully tried to attain an identity document for four years . There have also been reports of the incompetency of the officers themselves. For instance some of them do not even know the relevant documents that need to be submitted for a particular visa application. In some scenarios, 2 identical applicants submitting the exact documents for the exact visa might not get the same response. One might be refused while the other one might be approved. Some applicants might have their applications rejected several times, either because they are only being informed of the relevant documents to be submitted each time their applications get rejected or the Home Affairs officials processing the documents are themselves not aware of the immigration rules of the country and thus a well completed application that deserved to be approved might still be rejected. It is not surprising that a straightforward application might take up to 2 years to be processed, while ideally in an effective system, they would be processed in a couple of months at worst. The consequences of such inefficiency can be worrying. Many foreigners thus often find themselves working illegally or even losing their bread winning job, simply because the system takes too long to process their visas.
Communication is also a major issue. Apart from the call centre, where the operators can provide technical advise with regards to lodging complaints, follow ups on applications and referring a complaint or question to the " Right Person" , there is actually no efficient way of contacting the actual immigration officers themselves, especially when it comes to getting explanation and professional advises on delicate matters. Phone calls usually go unanswered. Emails sent to the designated immigration officers also go unswered most of the time. If a phone call or an email ever get answered, the applicant usually gets told that his complaint or request will be referred to the "Right Person" and that an immigration officer will contact him in due time. It turns out that most of the time the applicant never gets called back. What usually follows is that the applicant usually phone again or send a new email only to have a totally new person attending to him ( if he is lucky enough ), to whom the applicant will have to reexplain his entire problem. This vicious cycle usually goes on for a long time to the point that some applicants actually give up because of the harshness of the system.
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Wikipedia