Shifting policies to suit anti-migrant narrative in South Africa: A case for Zimbabwean Exemption Permit (ZEP) business permit holders

Based on three cases drawn from the consultation with Zimbabwean migrants whose Business Exemption Permits were terminated by the South African Government without following due process, this paper disallows the economic reasons advanced for such a decision. To this effect, this paper argues that ZEP business permit holders cannot be said to be taking jobs away from nationals. On the contrary, this paper argues that ZEP business permit holders, while contributing to economic growth, also employ South Africans, thereby reducing the unemployment rate. It is on this basis that this paper argues that the termination of the ZEP dispensation is a populist measure to fit the anti-migrant sentiment in the country. It is an electoral engineering mechanism fuelled by xenophobic sentiments to tap into the electoral base of some political parties and a device to demonstrate that the government is tackling the migration issue. If that was not the case, ZEP business permit holders’ waiver application should be readily granted. On this note, this paper recommends that ZEP business permit holders should be exempted from the requirements of a business visa application because they are non-negligible contributors to the economic growth of the country.