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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 PRETORIA 001766 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PREL PHUM PREF KTIP SF
SUBJECT: WOMEN MIGRANTS IN SOUTH AFRICA: A HARD ROAD TO 
TRAVEL 
 
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Summary 
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¶1.  In an August 27 panel discussion, three speakers 
discussed the plight of female migrants in South Africa. 
Compared to men, women on the move are more vulnerable to 
robbery and attack, facing more limited job options, and 
often encumbered by children.  Border crossings are extremely 
risky for rape, yet foreign women are especially reluctant to 
seek help, for fear of police harassment or deportation. 
Even as bona fide asylum applicants, migrants suffer ill 
treatment or even denial of service by unsympathetic 
government workers.  The xenophobic violence of 2008 left 
many women traumatized and alienated from families and 
communities.  Foreign women in the audience begged the 
government to relaunch anti-xenophobia campaigns, as they 
remained fearful and felt forgotten by the media.  End 
Summary. 
 
¶2.  In keeping with Secretary Clinton's pledge to put women 
at the heart of U.S. foreign policy, this look at one segment 
of women -- those who migrate from abroad and from rural 
areas -- is the first in a series of such profiles. 
 
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Greater Burdens, More Constraints 
--------------------------------- 
 
¶3.  Dr. Ingrid Palmary, of Wits University's Forced Migration 
Studies Programme (FMSP), characterized female migrants as 
typically less 'visible' than males, and yet in myriad ways 
far more exposed to risks.  Despite a long tradition of women 
participating in family mobility, academic studies of 
migration are traditionally focused on male breadwinners.  As 
a result, "we know very little about women's livelihoods -- 
where they move to, and how they manage."  Women's physical 
vulnerability prompts them to keep lower profiles for safety, 
while at the same time it disadvantages them in competing for 
employment and requiring secure accomodation.  Classic jobs 
readily available to unskilled laborers, such as mining or 
farm work, are geared to men's physical strength and housing 
in male hostels. 
 
¶4.  Children, most often left in the charge of women, 
compound the challenges of migration, making mobility itself 
harder and costlier.  Children complicate the search for a 
job, since potential work hours are limited by available 
child care, which in turn takes a big share of wages.  While 
all mothers face child care burdens, those of migrant women 
are heavier since they have left behind their networks of 
extended family.  Accomodation is similarly more complicated 
and expensive, including considerations of schooling.  FMSP 
research indicates migrants accompanied by children are more 
likely to land in informal settlements, i.e. the country's 
rougher shantytowns.  Where possible, many women leave their 
children behind in the home country or village, hoping to 
send for them later. 
 
------------------------------------- 
"Just Rape" Is Not Grounds for Refuge 
------------------------------------- 
 
¶5.  Women fall easier prey than men to physical attack, and 
travelers far from home are doubly exposed, yet foreigners 
are also the segment of women least likely to seek formal 
protection or support.  Vulnerability is highest, says 
Palmary, along the country's borders with Zimbabwe and 
Mozambique, where syndicates of smugglers and criminals 
routinely rob and rape travelers crossing rivers and bushland 
into South Africa.  (This has implications for policy: the 
FMSP warns that tighter border control, instead of 
QFMSP warns that tighter border control, instead of 
facilitated migration, increases threats to women.)  In a 
country where even local citizens report rape to the police 
only rarely (in an estimated one in nine cases), migrants' 
fear of police harassment and deportation acts as an 
additional deterrent to seeking police protection.  These 
fears, coupled with routine ill-treatment of foreigners by 
front-line government workers, make female migrants most 
loathe to seek medical treatment, counseling, and legal 
support in incidents of gender violence. 
 
¶6.  Palmary says the SAG's asylum decisions reflect 
discrimination against women, by revealing an underlying 
attitude that gender violence is endemic and ordinary, and 
 
PRETORIA 00001766  002 OF 003 
 
 
hence not a basis for asylum.  Palmary rates South Africa's 
Refugee Act as "the most progressive in the world," and 
"groundbreaking" in explicitly recognizing gender violence as 
a form of persecution (cf. the war in DR Congo) -- but FMSP 
finds that in practice the SAG does not rule accordingly. 
Palmary asserts there is a tendency (denied by Home Affairs) 
to classify countries as "safe" or "unsafe" in blanket terms, 
whereas in reality many societies not at war may still be 
very brutal against their most vulnerable members.  (As an 
aside, Palmary challenges: with South Africa's extremes of 
violent crime, can it be truly considered "post conflict"?) 
Verdicts in asylum cases suggest a bias that "just rape," 
even if recurrent or pervasive, is not enough cause to flee. 
 
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Denied Services (Even with Papers) 
---------------------------------- 
 
¶7.  Dosso Ndessomin, of the Coordinating Body for Refugee 
Communities (CBRC), highlighted the hurdles faced by migrant 
women in accessing public services.  Employment, health care, 
and schooling hinge on asylum application papers (called 
"Section 22" permits per the Refugee Act), which require 
persistence in long queues (and some would say bribes) to 
obtain and regularly renew.  Migrants often report, however, 
that these documents are not honored by SAG employees. 
Ndessomin recalls a 2006 case of a Somali woman, in 
possession of a Section 22 permit, who gave birth outside 
Johannesburg General Hospital after staff would not admit 
her.  A common problem is that women cannot open bank 
accounts without a "proof of residence," when their homes may 
be abroad or in husbands' names.  From all the constraints 
described above, single mothers are least able to access 
services for their children: CBRC has a roster of nearly 
5,000 such kids not attending school.  Women come to CBRC for 
help, says Ndessomin, "with so few resources -- it's like 
begging." 
 
----------------------------- 
Onus on Migrants to Integrate 
----------------------------- 
 
¶8.  Ndessomin notes that the range of hardships faced by 
foreigners can cause them to become discouraged and 
withdrawn, yet paradoxically the onus is on them to reach out 
to host communities.  A common syndrome, he says, is for 
African migrants to arrive in South Africa with inflated 
expectations of a better life, only to be quickly 
disappointed.  In its outreach visits to diverse migrant 
groups, the CBRC stresses that foreigners must introduce 
themselves to host communities and increase interactions in 
order to integrate.  Several community-level initiatives are 
reportedly now underway, led by NGOs like the Mandela 
Foundation and Caritas Peace Initiative.  (Note: the Somali 
Community Board, inter alia, has also sought USG funding for 
such outreach, teaching Somali shopkeepers to build bridges 
with customers.  End note.)  Social ties not only help 
migrants feel at home, but they also help to counter 
xenophobic threats in troubled townships. 
 
------------------------------------ 
Trauma Effects of Xenophobic Attacks 
------------------------------------ 
 
¶9.  Marivic Garcia-Mall of the Centre for the Study of 
Violence and Reconciliation (CSVR) described the 
psychological impact on female migrants of 2008's xenophobic 
violence, as observed at CSVR's Trauma Clinic in 
Johannesburg.  After the initial shocks of threats to their 
QJohannesburg.  After the initial shocks of threats to their 
lives and expulsion from their shacks, displaced migrants 
taking refuge at the SAG's temporary shelter sites were 
subject to sexual abuse, compelled to engage in prostitution 
to support their kids, and at risk of rape in nighttime 
visits to unlit toilets.  Women at these sites showed 
symptoms of post-traumatic stress: jumpiness, paranoia, 
hopelessness, low self-esteem and self-blame, disassociation 
from acutely painful events, and cognitive disorders. 
Mothers displayed impatience and aggression toward their own 
children, aggravated by the clinging behavior of traumatized 
kids, and domestic violence erupted in previously peaceful 
families.  Elevated levels of stress and hostility led to 
fights in food lines, and to isolation of many women.  In 
effect, abuse and alienation already suffered as foreign 
migrants were amplified during displacement.  On 
reintegration into townships, women started their lives over 
 
PRETORIA 00001766  003 OF 003 
 
 
facing the same hurdles as on their initial arrival in South 
Africa. 
 
---------------------------------------- 
Migrants to SAG: Please Fight Xenophobia 
---------------------------------------- 
 
¶10.  The audience, composed largely of foreign women, agreed 
with panelists' assessments and vehemently urged renewed 
attention to the plight of migrants in South Africa.  A 
Congolese woman wondered what had happened to last year's 
media coverage, which had spiked during xenophobic attacks 
(May-June 2008) but then sputtered out thereafter.  Joyce 
Dube of the South African Women's Institute for Migration 
Affairs (SAWIMA; 2008 recipient of a USG refugee grant) spoke 
of the positive impact of SAWIMA workshops in townships, led 
by Zimbabweans who use roleplay to convey their experiences 
to South African youths.  A Somali man wondered what had 
happened to the "Roll Back Xenophobia" campaign, a joint 
effort of UNHCR and the South African Human Rights Commission 
(SAHRC) some years ago.  Audience members buttonholed an 
SAHRC officer in the audience and begged for renewed focus on 
their needs.  After the xenophobic violence of 2008, migrants 
are still fearful for their safety, and now that media has 
moved on to other stories they also feel forgotten. 
 
GIPS