March and March to challenge Constitutional Court asylum ruling

March and March to challenge Constitutional Court asylum ruling Siya Tsewu Sat, 10/17/2026 - 12:33

JOHANNESBURG - March and March has said it will fight what it calls unfair asylum rules in response to a Constitutional Court ruling.

The apex court ruled asylum seekers must have access to the process, with every claim assessed on its merits.

But March and March argued the way these laws are implemented can work against South Africans.

Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma, the organisation's leader, said they want refugee camps where officials can screen and verify asylum seekers at the border.

" Illegal immigrants must remain illegal immigrants. And we've been saying and preaching this for the longest time that if we had refugee camps, all of this would not be happening because people who are at the border and come in claiming to be asylum seekers would have one set place where they are all processed and checked and verified if they are truly indeed asylum seekers.

"But in a country where asylum seekers are given even rights to open businesses and look for jobs, obviously everyone will look for loopholes to abuse the system. So now we're just opening up ourselves to further abuse, and the reason why we further know that what we're saying is supported is that the Home Affairs department itself said that 95% of the people who are actually applying for asylum seeker status are not real asylum seekers.

"So why would we want to waste resources and time going through people who we already have a clear database of them not being really asylum seekers and migrants? And then they come into the country and once they're in the country, they start litigating against government because they don't want to leave.

"So I'm hearing a lot of people saying that people don't understand the Constitutional Court judgment and what it says. We absolutely understand what it says, but we know that the laws of the country have been used several times to go against the people of South Africa. And the implementation of those laws has never ever been to the satisfaction of South Africa, and that's why we're saying that we don't want that to happen, and we're gonna stand and fight it no- whichever way that we have to fight it."