PRETORIA - Home Affairs is warning against attempts to exploit the recent Constitutional Court ruling on asylum applications.
The judgment has caused confusion, with some interpreting it to mean that rejected asylum seekers cannot be deported, even if they entered the country illegally.
Home Affairs Minister Leon Schrieber said the Concourt did not remove their right as Home Affairs to adjudicate a refugee application.
“If someone doesn't qualify, it is our job to say you don't qualify and you must be deported. That is what happens in 95 % of cases that are finally adjudicated. So we take the challenge very seriously to now finally get our asylum system working with the kind of speed we need to adjudicate these matters.
“But when someone's asylum claim fails, they will be deported in terms of our laws. And that includes the online platform. So I want to sound a warning here. This is not a free fall. This is not an opportunity for chances to overwhelm our systems. We are going digital, we will get your biometrics in the process, and if you have submitted a spurious claim which fails, for the first time government is going to know exactly what you look like, who you are, and we are dealing with this issue of invisibility that is often exploited in our immigration system.
“We also regard this as an opportunity to say if you want to submit an asylum claim, you'll be able to do so through this platform. But, just be very clear, if you are a chancer, this is the platform that is also going to help us deal with that in terms of law enforcement.”