March and March movement organiser Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma said they have made an impact with having the South African President Cyril Ramaphosa making his speech announcing the measures he has taken to resolve the immigration issue in the country.
Ngobese-Zuma first expressed gratitude to the movement’s patriots, saying they compelled Ramaphosa to address the nation but they were not entirely convinced that his plans would work.
“Firstly, I just want to appreciate the work that Patriots have done to actually push the president and to actually address the issue after months. Actually, some have been trying for years to get him to acknowledge this as a crisis, and he hasn’t. And finally, he’s put it as something that’s important to his agenda,” she said while reacting to Ngobese-Zuma said they were happy for the president to acknowledge some of their issues, including “tuck shops being taken over by foreign nationals”. 
“He’s acknowledged the issue of some of the crimes that they do in the country. He also acknowledged the labour markets which have been, um, um, now bombarded with people who are cheap labour coming from all across Africa to replace South Africans and break immigration laws,” she said.
Ngobese-Zuma believes Ramaphosa is misguided when it comes to these issues, claiming he is approaching the issue from a political standpoint when saying people attempt to gain political power through immigration, “or these groups are rising because they believe they want to be in politics.”
“I can safely assure you that personally for me I have no desire to be in politics, and for me a safer country for our children is what would make me happy. But here’s my biggest problem. I don’t think the president was properly briefed. I don’t think he took time to go to Home Affairs, to go to the border, or to find out the extent of the damage because the issues that he’s raising as solutions are impractical. And I can tell you now that some of the things, if not all of them, that he said are not going to be implementable,” she said.
March and March stated that it was not feasible to crack down on immigration by prohibiting people from entering the nation illegally alone. Ngobese-Zuma also stated that eliminating corruption in the immigration system required specific measures.
“The president doesn’t understand the immigration crisis. I think from what he was saying I could figure that out. First of all, he says that they’re going to increase deportations and increase courts. That’s not the issue. The current issue is they don’t have enough transport to deport people. The borders between the drones that they have are not enough. The border is operating at 25% capacity. So, 75% of our border is open,” she said.
Ngobese-Zuma stated that tackling the immigration issue would necessitate a comprehensive plan to respond to the porous borders, with the president admitting that border security is barely 25% functional. She claimed that at the ports, there is only one scanner equipment that can identify who is crossing the border.
“On top of that, he talks about being able to increase immigration officers on the ground by eight and says they’re the only people that can do that. And there are only 800 immigration officers in the entire country,” Ngobese-Zuma said.
March and March stated they are still sceptical that a plan for properly deporting and verifying illegal immigrants exists. Ngobese-Zuma stated that the Home Affairs system is currently not responding to the fact that employees use their personal cell phones and that only 800 immigration officers can be effectively serviced. She also addressed refugees, stating that there are currently “more fake refugees than genuine refugees in South Africa.”
“And he’s not talking about how to get rid of the current refugees that he has before telling us about refugee centres. Because putting those refugee centres there is not going to help if you’ve got documents. So, tell us how you’re going to get rid of the people who have documents that are fake currently,” she said.
