MOZAMBICAN AND CONGOLESE REFUGEES IN SOUTH AFRICA

The document examines two distinct waves of forced migration to South Africa: Mozambicans fleeing civil war in the 1980s and Congolese migrants arriving from the 1990s. It highlights a persistent gap between the legal rights granted to refugees and the social reality of their reception, characterized by economic marginalization and xenophobia. Mozambican refugees, primarily rural peasants, were often ghettoized in homelands like Gazankulu and exploited as low-wage agricultural labor. Congolese migrants, typically urban and middle-class, face significant social dislocation, with many highly educated professionals relegated to survivalist roles such as car guarding and street vending. In both cases, the author argues that state officials and local communities often ignore formal legal statuses, maintaining the migrants' de facto 'illegal' status to sustain cheap labor markets or satisfy xenophobic impulses.

• Between 250,000 and 350,000 Mozambicans fled to South Africa during the 1980s civil war. While the apartheid government denied them formal refugee status, the Shangaan-speaking homeland of Gazankulu provided land and assistance based on ethnic solidarity.
• Mozambican refugees in the 1980s occupied a precarious legal position where they were de facto legal within homeland borders but risked arrest and deportation if they entered South Africa proper.
• In the lowveld agricultural sector, a three-tiered labor market emerged where undocumented Mozambican migrants formed a 'third tier' of temporary workers earning extremely low wages (R4.50 to R6 per day in 1998), often with the tacit collusion of security forces who avoided raiding farms.
• The UNHCR's voluntary repatriation programme for Mozambicans starting in 1993 was largely unsuccessful; only 31,074 of an expected 250,000 people enrolled, partly because the programme was perceived to foreclose options and the UNHCR reduced food aid to encourage return.
• Despite gaining permanent residence status by 2000 and winning the right to social grants in 2004, many former Mozambican refugees remain a marginalized underclass, facing continued discrimination in infrastructure access and employment.
• Congolese forced migration is characterized as a predominantly young, urban, male, and middle-class phenomenon, with 47% possessing tertiary education and only 4% unemployed in the DRC.
• Congolese refugees experience severe social and economic dislocation in South Africa; 29% are unemployed, and 50% work in unskilled survivalist roles such as street vending, car guarding, and haircutting.
• Congolese refugees often rely on tight-knit, defensive ethnic networks (sometimes called 'tribes' or 'families') for survival and cultural preservation, reflecting a distrust of both South Africans and other Congolese groups.
• Congolese asylum seekers frequently encounter systemic corruption and institutional failure at the Department of Home Affairs, including the institutionalized payment of bribes to 'interpreters' to expedite applications.
• Congolese refugees have come to dominate specific low-end service niches, such as car guarding and haircutting, because these roles are often avoided by South Africans due to their low status and demanding nature.

APA

STEINBERG, J. (2005). MOZAMBICAN AND CONGOLESE REFUGEES IN SOUTH AFRICA. Institute for Security Studies. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/117FULL.PDF

Chicago

STEINBERG, JONNY. MOZAMBICAN AND CONGOLESE REFUGEES IN SOUTH AFRICA. Institute for Security Studies, 2005. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/117FULL.PDF.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=STEINBERG |first1=JONNY |title=MOZAMBICAN AND CONGOLESE REFUGEES IN SOUTH AFRICA |publisher=Institute for Security Studies |date=June 2005 |url=https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/117FULL.PDF |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{steinberg2005mozambican, author = {STEINBERG, JONNY}, title = {{MOZAMBICAN AND CONGOLESE REFUGEES IN SOUTH AFRICA}}, institution = {Institute for Security Studies}, year = {2005}, month = jun, url = {https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/117FULL.PDF}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }