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Migrants scapegoated in South Africa as inequality and unemployment surge

There are no quick fixes to South Africa’s problems – but politicians across the spectrum talk like turning on immigrants is a silver bullet

By Colleta Dewa
Migrants scapegoated in South Africa as inequality and unemployment surge
Immigrants displaced by anti-foreigner violence in Johannesburg look on at a refugee camp in Germiston in May 2008 | Siphiwe Sibeko/Reuters/Alamy
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Noreen Chasi lost her brother and husband in South Africa’s 2008 xenophobic attacks in which nearly 100 foreign nationals were killed. This year, it all seems to be happening all over again.

“They destroyed my stall,” Chasi told openDemocracy. “All the produce I had just purchased for resale was confiscated. That reminded me of the 2008 attacks. They have added salt to a wound which was starting to heal. I am so terrified.”

Chasi is a Zimbabwean immigrant in Soweto township, a suburb of Johannesburg, South Africa. She spoke to this website following January’s spate of violence against foreign nationals in South Africa.

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Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0