JOHANNESBURG: South African authorities have arrested and will expel seven Kenyans accused of working without the correct documentation on a US government program to accept white Afrikaners as “refugees,” the home affairs department said Wednesday.
US President Donald Trump’s administration in May offered refugee status to the minority white Afrikaner community, claiming they were victims of discrimination and even “genocide,” which the Pretoria government strongly denies.
The US government reportedly engaged Kenyans from a Christian NGO based in Kenya to come to South Africa to fast-track the processing of applications for resettlement under the program.
During a raid on an application processing center in Johannesburg on Tuesday, “seven Kenyan nationals were discovered engaging in work despite only being in possession of tourist visas, in clear violation of their conditions of entry into the country,” the South African home affairs department said.
“They were arrested and issued with deportation orders, and will be prohibited from entering South Africa again for a five-year period,” it said in a statement.
The raid came after “intelligence reports indicated that a number of Kenyan nationals had recently entered South Africa on tourist visas and had illegally taken up work at a center processing the applications of so-called ‘refugees’ to the United States,” it said.
Trump essentially halted refugee arrivals after taking office in January but made an exception for the Afrikaners despite Pretoria’s insistence that they do not face persecution.
A first group of around 50 Afrikaners — descendants of the first European settlers of South Africa — were flown to the United States on a chartered plane in May. Others have reportedly followed in smaller numbers and on commercial flights.
The South African home affairs department said no US officials were arrested in the raid, which was not conducted at a diplomatic site.
No prospective “refugees” were harassed, it said, adding that the government had contacted US and Kenyan officials over the issue.
- ‘Unacceptable’ -
Ties between Washington and Pretoria have plummeted since Trump took office in January, with his administration lashing out at South Africa over a range of policies, expelling its ambassador in March and imposing 30-percent trade tariffs.
After reports emerged of a raid, US State Department spokesman Tommy Pigott said in a statement to US media that “interfering” in US refugee operations was “unacceptable.”
Washington officials were “seeking immediate clarification from the South African government and expect full cooperation and accountability,” he said.
