UNHCR to push for community co-existence in S. Africa

The United Nations High Commission on Refugees (UNHCR) will help push for peaceful coexistence between refugees, asylum seekers and host communities in South Africa, it was announced on Tuesday.

For this purpose, the UNHCR will host a roundtable on Wednesday in Pretoria, in cooperation with the South African Moral Regeneration Movement (MRM), to seek practical solutions for peaceful coexistence between refugees, asylum seekers and host communities in South Africa.

The discussion is the first in a series of deliberations organised and hosted by the UNHCR and the MRM to bring refugees and their South African hosts together in finding solutions that will productively draw both communities into the socio-economic fabric of the country, the UNHCR said in a press release.

"Recent xenophobic violence against foreign traders in Gauteng and neighbouring provinces has underscored the urgency with which this matter must be dealt," said Clementine Nkweta-Salami, UNHCR's Regional Representative for Southern Africa.

Seth Mazibuko, Chief Operating Officer of the MRM, said, "In bringing together representatives from the affected communities we hope to help them chart a way forward that will ensure peaceful co- existence, irrespective of race, colour or creed."

The roundtable community dialogue will include Advocate Lawrence Mushwana of the South African Human Rights Commission (SAHRC), representatives from the South African Police Services, and other government departments including the Departments of Home Affairs, Arts and Culture, as well as city officials from Pretoria and Johannesburg.

Even more importantly, representatives from both refugee and host communities will attend, the release said.

Through dialogue between panelists and respondents, the UNHCR and MRM said they are hopeful that this first step in supporting refugees and host communities engage each other in problem solving and solution seeking will be replicated in other provinces which have also been subject to xenophobic violence.

Xenophobia is deeply rooted in South Africa, where foreigners are blamed for taking up jobs that would have belonged to locals.

In January refugees and foreign nationals in Soweto, southwest of Johannesburg were forced to flee their homes and abandon livelihoods which were looted and destroyed in a wave of xenophobic violence by individuals they live and work amongst.

Xenophobia violence erupted again in Soweto and some other parts of the country in early March. In the violence, a number of foreigners were attacked and their shops looted. Endi