THE Home Affairs Department has introduced a 90-day visa waiver for Zimbabweans planning to live in South Africa for less than three months while they seek jobs.

Deputy Minister Malusi Gigaba said during a surprise visit to Port Elizabeth’s refugee centre yesterday that Zimbabweans could now take their identity documents to the department to register instead of applying for asylum documentation.

The department had set aside Thursdays and Fridays to attend to Southern African Development Community (SADC) nationals seeking temporary residence permits.

He said thousands of SADC nationals entered the country each week, followed by Asians, Chinese, Bangladeshis, Ethiopians and Somalis.

Gigaba said about 1500 Zimbabwean asylum seekers registered in Pretoria each week, about 1000 in Cape Town and Durban, and an average of 100 in Port Elizabeth.

Gigaba, who said he was looking at challenges facing refugee centres,
conceded the department had not been paying attention to them.

“Part of the changes that we will make is that of separating the
economic migrants and asylum seekers. In the past, the department had a huge
number of foreigners seeking asylum. A number of them cannot be helped
because of the influx of Zimbabweans in the country and the shortage of
staff in the department.

“In the past few years, we have seen a drop in Ethiopian and Somali
nationals seeking asylum documents while the number of Zimbabweans and SADC
nationals has excessively gone up,” Gigaba added.

The Port Elizabeth office had also been earmarked for an upgrade.

“This is due to the number of car accidents happening in the area.
More staff will also be employed in order to speed up the services offered
by the department,” he said.