Zimbabwean Humanitarian Migration into Southern Africa: Inadequate Regional Responses
The exodus of Zimbabweans into neighbouring countries is one of the greatest challenges and opportunities for the region, yet Southern African countries are struggling to respond appropriately. A new study by the Forced Migration Studies Programme (FMSP) at the University of the Witwatersrand finds that the humanitarian nature of Zimbabwean migration blurs the traditional distinctions between refugees and economic migrants. However, official responses to Zimbabwean migration in Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique are still premised on this distinction and so are failing to protect both Zimbabweans and the citizens of neighbouring countries.
Many poor Zimbabweans rely on migration to other countries to support their families. They are neither refugees, as most do not apply for refugee status, nor are they voluntary economic migrants, given the extent of economic collapse of their country. They can be termed ‘forced humanitarian migrants’ who move for the purpose of their and their dependents’ basic survival. Currently only recognized refugees and asylum seekers qualify for humanitarian assistance and legal protection from a host state. To get this protection, most of the countries in the region, apart from South Africa, require asylum seekers and refugees to live in isolated camps and do not allow them to work or travel back to their home country. This makes it impossible for Zimbabweans to fulfil their main need: to send money and goods to their families. Most Zimbabweans therefore do not apply for asylum but move back and forth between countries as shoppers, visitors, short term and long term skilled and unskilled labourers, as well as formal and informal traders. Undocumented Zimbabweans’ needs remain invisible and unmet since undocumented migrants fall outside the mandates of the two key support structures in humanitarian assistance – government and non government institutions. Migrants’ lives therefore remain precarious, earning meagre incomes in the host countries and barely covering their basic human needs for shelter and food.
The FMSP study ‘Zimbabwean Migration in Southern Africa: New Trends and Responses’ was conducted in Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique and commissioned by Oxfam. While Zimbabwean migration to South Africa is increasingly well understood, this is the first report to document governmental and non-governmental responses in these countries and at the regional level.
Monica Kiwanuka, the main researcher of the report, notes that the vulnerability of Zimbabwean migrants is fuelled by the lack of a single regional strategy or legal instrument to respond to this livelihood seeking migration, the inappropriateness of current refugee settlement options, as well as a lack of access to passports within Zimbabwe. These factors motivate undocumented movement and expose Zimbabweans to deportation. They also limit access to humanitarian assistance and legal employment.
Botswana, Malawi, Zambia and Mozambique have responded to Zimbabwean migrants differently. In Malawi, Zambia and Botswana, the asylum system is open to Zimbabweans but very few have made use of it. Mozambique, however, has refused refugee status to Zimbabweans who applied for it.
Although all four countries criminalize unlawful entry, unlawful work and overstaying of permits by foreigners and enforce this through deportation and other means, Botswana regularly deports particularly large numbers of Zimbabweans. Mozambique and Zambia also target suspected Zimbabwean female sex workers for deportation. Deportations of Zimbabweans signify at best a lack of protection from the crisis they are trying to escape, and at worst, regular flouting of the principle of non-refoulement, which is the international legal prohibition of returning a person to a country where he or she might be in danger.
Regardless of persistent deportations and other means of exclusion, poor Zimbabweans are prepared to gain entry into host countries to earn income. As one Zimbabwean interviewed for the report in Gaborone explained, “To accept to return home after being dropped at Plumtree means I have agreed to let my people die…you [would] rather die trying to get back inside and find money to keep them alive … we all want to be out of trouble, but where can we find the passports these people want from us?”
Whereas Zimbabweans are able to access essential basic services such as basic health care and free antiretroviral therapy (ART) in Malawi, Mozambique and Zambia, this is not the case for migrants and refugees in Botswana. Excluding migrant groups from health services, including antiretroviral therapy, threatens to undermine national and regional population health and obstructs the effective management of health impacts within the region.
Finally, although some advocacy work has been undertaken by international and national non-governmental organisations to support Zimbabwean migrants, these organisations are few and national NGOs often lack the necessary capacity to deal with this kind of mixed livelihood seeking migration.
The report provides recommendations to government institutions and non-government organizations regarding future responses to Zimbabwean movement and other similar types of migration in the region.
For more information please contact the following persons:
Monica Kiwanuka, Researcher, Forced Migration Studies Programme, mokina66@gmail.com, 0782644215
Darshan Vigneswaran, Senior Researcher, Forced Migration Studies Programme Darshan.vigneswaran@wits.ac.za, 0788541828
