South Africa’s Home Affairs launches online asylum applications
By the AFREEQUE newsroom, based on ITWeb
South Africa’s Home Affairs department has launched a digital platform for registering asylum intentions, the first stage of a fully digital system. The portal, currently being tested, is due to open to the public after the next software update, according to the department, which sees it as a way to reduce corruption and delays.
South Africa’s Department of Home Affairs, headed by Minister Leon Schreiber, is opening a digital platform allowing asylum seekers to register online their intention to apply for asylum, according to a department statement. The portal, initially accessible to a first batch of test cases, will open to the public after the next software update planned for this weekend. It constitutes the first phase of a future end-to-end digital asylum system.
Applicants must upload their facial biometric data, personal information and supporting documents. The department says the system will eliminate opportunities for corruption and reduce processing times. Later phases will integrate machine learning and artificial intelligence tools to clear the decades-old backlog of asylum appeals and speed up the deportation of the 95% of applicants who are regularly rejected.
The department says it is thereby implementing the Constitutional Court ruling of 7 July. A directive of 28 September, which asked refugee reception offices to accept applications regardless of migration status, had caused queues of thousands of foreigners outside the country’s five offices. Anti-immigration protests then turned violent in Durban and Soweto on 8 October, with vehicles set alight and shops looted.
