--- title: The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa | TIME description: For Zimbabwe refugees escaping violence in their home country, seeking asylum in South Africa can mean assault on the streets, refused work and attacks by local politicians canonical: https://time.com/video/jpW2hYvj/ og:title: The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa og:description: For Zimbabwe refugees escaping violence in their home country, seeking asylum in South Africa can mean assault on the streets, refused work and attacks by local politicians og:url: https://time.com/video/jpW2hYvj/ og:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/jpW2hYvj/poster.jpg?width=720 og:type: video.other twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa twitter:description: For Zimbabwe refugees escaping violence in their home country, seeking asylum in South Africa can mean assault on the streets, refused work and attacks by local politicians twitter:image: https://cdn.jwplayer.com/v2/media/jpW2hYvj/poster.jpg?width=720 --- # The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. ## Video: The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa [Watch (HLS stream): The Dangers for Asylum Seekers in South Africa](https://cdn.jwplayer.com/manifests/jpW2hYvj.m3u8) (5:51)  _Published 2010-09-07. For Zimbabwe refugees escaping violence in their home country, seeking asylum in South Africa can mean assault on the streets, refused work and attacks by local politicians_ --- Jul 27, 2023 3:04 PM UTC --- ## More From This Series [All Videos](https://time.com/video/) [U.K. Leader Condemns Attack on Asylum-Seeker Hotel as Far-Right Violence Spreads](/video/eLhIuzZp/) ### U.K. Leader Condemns Attack on Asylum-Seeker Hotel as Far-Right Violence Spreads [What to Know About the Asylum Seeker Standoff on Manus Island](/video/zBXRIByA/) ### What to Know About the Asylum Seeker Standoff on Manus Island [Know Right Now: Sweden to Deport Rejected Asylum-Seekers](/video/yoaC84fY/) ### Know Right Now: Sweden to Deport Rejected Asylum-Seekers --- ## Transcript >> On a Monday night, Johannesburg Central Methodist Church is packed to the brim. Wellington Sithole watches the boy. He says more than a thousand people are inside, but they aren't here to pray. >> Most of them, they [ unk ] as you can see it now. People have [ unk ] but it's so [ unk ]. >> A recent United Nations report confirms what Sithole, a Zimbabwean refugee sees every night. South Africa is now the number destination for asylum seekers in the world. Last year, around 222, 000 people claimed asylum in Africa's most prosperous nation. That's a problem for a country with high unemployment, lack of affordable housing and a history of xenophobic violence. Since around 2004, the Central Methodist Church has been a converging point for all of these problems. The international NGO, Doctors Without Borders, which only operates on the most desperate stages, even set up an office next to the church. Wellington Sithole manages a help desk at the church where he also spends his nights on the floor. He takes statements from immigrants who experience xenophobic attacks. >> Don't know when it's safe to me. He was [ Foreign Language ]. He told me he was a [ Foreign Language ] [ Foreign Language ] >> 58- year- old Bishop Paul Verryn oversees the Central Methodist Church. The building has long been a haven for the homeless, a group that is now dominated in numbers by foreign refugees. An outbreak of xenophobic violence in 2008 left 61 people dead and tens of thousands displaced. The attacks focused around complaints of foreigners stealing local jobs. Around a third of South Africans are unemployed and more than half within poverty. Bishop Paul Verryn says immigrants have simply become scapegoats for South Africa's own failures. >> Political opportunists use the foreign national context to try and breed credibility for themselves. They also represent the anxiety around the economic space and really take us to the very heart of what the key issue is facing this nation at the moment. And the key issue is poverty. >> And Verryn says a major redistribution of wealth and resources is the only solution. >> The disparity between rich and the poor in this country is untenable. If we do not address it as a priority, we will see blood flow in our streets like rivers. >> It's dusk in Selecta Township just outside of Johannesburg. Children and teenagers play soccer and ride bikes in front of an old converted seminary dormitory. This is Bishop Paul Verryn's other project, a shelter for around a hundred Zimbabwean youth from babies to teenagers. Most of the children are referred to as orphans although many do have parents either back home or somewhere in South Africa. I have seen unthinkable claims like this boy. The caretaker say he was burned alive in a politically- motivated attack back in Zimbabwe. -[ Foreign Language ] It's very different from what we expect out of these children, really. A lot of things [ unk ] but, you know. >> Patrick Matombo is a care worker at the Refugee Youth Center. Matombo says the 100 or so boys and girls go to local schools with local children. But at night time, they're advised to stay on the center grounds. Matombo says people from the neighborhood sometimes walk by and taunt them. >> Like yesterday, they received a threat from a community member, that are you ready to take your stuff to go? It was- you should go. >> It's comments like these that really frustrates Zimbabwean refugee, Gidmorgif Nutza. >> Normally, as refugees, the [ unk ] federal government understand exactly are we- our being here or else they bring you a political refugee. >> Nutza, a political activist, was tortured so brutally back home that some media have reported him dead and he says, if there was one country in the world that should sympathize with Zimbabwe, it's South Africa. >> Even the ANC and the problem they gave, [ unk ] himself was also a refugee in another country. So, [ Foreign Language ]. >> Nutza says business interest and long- standing ties to Zimbabwean President Robert Mugabe means so means South Africa's leaders are unlikely to come to his rescue anytime soon. He says he's trying to save up money so he can move to a country that will finally let him live in peace. 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