Fear grips Crossroads as shops close under extortion pressure

The Director-General of the Interior Department has withdrawn a directive issued by his department on September 28 regarding the acceptance of asylum applications.

This decision followed a ruling by the Constitutional Court on July 7 in the case between the Scalabrini Centre in Cape Town and the Interior Department. This landmark decision, delivered by Judge Steven Majeddt, established that asylum seekers and their children cannot be entirely excluded from refugee status due to procedural shortcomings.

The judicial decision questioned the constitutionality of the current procedure regulated by the Refugee Act of 1998. According to this Act, asylum seekers are required to enter South Africa through a designated crossing point where they are issued a five-day transit visa. Furthermore, the Act requires asylum seekers to appear at the Refugee Reception Office (RRO) within five days.

Unrest occurred in the Soweto and Durban areas when angry residents clashed with foreign nationals, setting fire to vehicles and state infrastructure belonging to foreigners. These disturbances were a reaction to the directive issued by the Interior Department.

On Friday morning, the Interior Department announced that the initial directive was sent to all Refugee Reception Offices (Refugee RROs) as a purely operational measure intended to support the implementation of the Court's ruling without the knowledge of the Minister of the Interior.

In a statement, the Interior Department emphasized that claims of political motivation for the decision are categorically false, as the directive arose in connection with the Constitutional Court case against which the Department objected.

Moreover, the department acknowledged that its attempt to immediately implement the court ruling led to serious consequences that could not have been foreseen in the Court's ruling. These consequences include an overload of work at the RRO in the days following the issuance of the directive, threats to Department staff, and the emergence of serious threats to public safety and order.

As a further plan, the Department intends to begin a new process to determine the most suitable operational approach that ensures compliance with the Constitutional Court's ruling.

An updated regulation for providing benefits to guardians of adult individuals suffering from severe forms of intellectual disability has been approved in Uzbekistan. Now, the decision on granting this financial support will be made automatically.

The right to receive the benefit belongs to the official guardians of citizens who have reached the age of eighteen, provided they have the established corresponding diagnosis. This payment is intended directly for the person who officially cares for and looks after their adult ward.

The main innovation lies in changing the procedure for assigning the benefit. As soon as the necessary information is received, the decision to provide the payment will be generated automatically, which is intended to reduce the volume of individual administrative actions that guardians previously had to perform.

It was previously mentioned that the National Agency for Social Protection, together with the World Bank, held discussions regarding new criteria for determining social assistance. When assessing the level of need, it is planned to take into account not only the family's income level but also the presence of disability, chronic diseases, and the number of children, among other factors.