Written by: Badr Ahmed

Several cities in South Africa witnessed a new wave of anti-immigration protests on Tuesday, coinciding with the end of an unofficial deadline set by anti-immigrant groups for foreigners illegally residing in the country to leave, as violence and looting escalated, raising fears of a wider crisis.

Thousands of protesters marched through the streets of major cities, including Johannesburg and Durban, waving flags and carrying wooden sticks, chanting slogans demanding the deportation of illegal immigrants. The March and March group, which is leading the demonstrations, confirmed that it will continue to hold weekly marches until the authorities respond to its demands.

Anti-immigrant protests escalate in South Africa

The movement's leader, Jacinta Ngobisi, said their goal is to use state resources to remove all illegal immigrants from the country in the coming months, arguing that their presence exacerbates the unemployment crisis and increases pressure on public services.

The protests coincided with sporadic acts of violence, with at least four people killed, thousands of African migrants forced to leave their homes, many shops closed, and many foreign workers refraining from going to work for fear of being attacked.

In several areas, the protests witnessed riots and looting, with protesters throwing stones at police and suspected migrants in the Thembisa area north of Johannesburg. Security forces were deployed in a number of cities and used rubber bullets to disperse demonstrators in Pietermaritzburg, and arrested a number of those involved in looting.

Reports indicate that some property owners in Durban and Johannesburg evicted foreign tenants for fear that their properties would be vandalized, while dozens of migrants, including about 100 Congolese citizens, were left sleeping on the streets after being evicted from their homes.

Protests demanding the expulsion of illegal immigrants

These developments come amid ongoing waves of xenophobic violence in South Africa that have been occurring intermittently since 2008, often indiscriminately targeting both legal and illegal immigrants.

For his part, President Cyril Ramaphosa affirmed that concerns regarding illegal immigration are real and deserve to be heard, but at the same time stressed that the right to protest does not justify threatening, vandalizing, or using violence against others.

Despite accusations that immigrants cause unemployment and high crime rates, researchers maintain that these claims lack conclusive evidence. Official statistics indicate that the number of immigrants in South Africa is approximately three million, representing roughly 41 TP3T of the total population, yet the country continues to grapple with high unemployment and economic inequality more than three decades after the end of apartheid.