Friday, February 22, 2013

Fawu calls on officials to stop xenophobic arrest and deportation of farmworkers’

Imogen Vollenhoven
22February 2013


On Thursday the leadership of the Food and Allied Workers Union has learned with disdain and disappointment that officials from the Home Affairs Department and the officers from the South African Police Services are on a concerted xenophobic which-hunt of farm workers, who are mainly nationals from Zimbabwe and Lesotho, and in the process have arrested more than 140 in the town of Ceres and surrounding areas.

Fawu’s general secretary Katishi Masemola explains further that this morally repugnant campaign by Home Affairs and the Police was carried as from yesterday afternoon throughout the evening with workers taken from trucks and loaded to police vehicles and dropped off at the police stations.

Masemola  adds that as Fawu They  are aware of an emerging alliance between farmers labour brokers, who some masquerade as supporters of farm workers struggles and some in government, be they police officers, home affairs officials or councilors.

Masemola furthermore adds that the purpose of this campaign is to mete out punishment to the farm workers, especially foreign nationals, for having engaged in historically unprecedented strike action in pursuit of their demands.
 
Foreign nationals are punished for having part of the strike and local farm workers, punished differently, for not been xenophobic.

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