Lifeline for ZEP holders as Schreiber extends validity by another year

Home affairs minister Leon Schreiber has extended a lifeline to Zimbabwe Exemption Permit (ZEP) holders, extending the validity of the permits by another year.

ZEP holders were in a panic as the deadline for them to apply for new one-year exemption permits approached on Friday.

Schreiber, in a government gazette published on Friday, said he “decided to extend the validity of the ZEP until November 28 2025 for me to fulfil the duty placed on me by the Gauteng [north] high court to consult the affected ZEP holders and all other stakeholders on the future of the current dispensation.

“The reactivation of the immigration advisory board (IAB) is under way and its first task will be to consider, advise and enable the steps required for compliance with the order of the high court on the future of the ZEP.

“To give the IAB time to properly do its work and a fair process to be followed, I direct that: existing ZEPs shall be deemed to remain valid for the next 12 months, [that] no holder of a ZEP may be arrested, ordered to depart or be detained for purposes of deportation or deported for any reason related to him or her not having any valid exemption certificate.”

Schreiber also said permit holders should be allowed to enter and leave South Africa “provided he or she complies with all other requirements for entry into and departure” from South Africa “save for the reason of not having a valid visa endorsed in his or her passport.

“No ZEP holder should be required to produce a valid exemption certificate, visa or an authorisation letter to remain in the republic when making an application for any category of the visa for temporary sojourn in South Africa.”

The Constitutional Court earlier this year dismissed then-home affairs minister Aaron Motsoaledi’s bid to appeal the Pretoria high court ruling that found the scrapping of the ZEP was procedurally unfair and violated the constitutional rights of ZEP holders.

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