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KwaZulu-Natal has coughed up at least R1 million in transport costs to repatriate foreign nationals in the province to their countries of origin.vBetween 700 and 800 refugees had already been sent home, mainly to Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi, said the head of the eThekwini Municipality’s international and governance relations, Eric Apelgren.

KZN gives R1m to help foreign nationals return home
June 18, 2008
Wendy Jasson da Costa
KwaZulu-Natal has coughed up at least R1 million in transport costs to repatriate foreign nationals in the province to their countries of origin.

Between 700 and 800 refugees had already been sent home, mainly to Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi, said the head of the eThekwini Municipality’s international and governance relations, Eric Apelgren.

He said the provincial government, the municipality, religious organisations and NGOs had all contributed towards the transport costs.

Two weeks ago a special technical committee set up by the KZN government had visited sites where foreigners were being housed. More than 60% of them had said they no longer wanted to remain in the country.

Apelgren said the KZN government had asked the Mozambican, Zimbabwean, Tanzanian, Malawian and the Congolese embassies for help.

According to Apelgren, most of the foreigners were provided with transport from Durban to Johannesburg, after which their respective countries assumed the responsibility of getting them home.

However, the foreign affairs department had been asked to speak to representatives of the Tanzanian government because there had been no help from them so far. There were almost 100 Tanzanians in Durban who wanted to return home.

However, about 400 other foreigners did not want to leave Durban and had formed part of the reintegration programme, said Apelgren.

Meanwhile, police Dir Phindile Radebe said 71 people had been arrested in connection with xenophobic attacks and had appeared in courts in and around Durban.

Staff at Clairwood Hospital have started a collection of clothes and food to donate to the Red Cross to help foreigners.

Hospital spokesman Mbuso Khuboni said the goods collected would be taken to foreigners living in Cato Manor.