Ndwedwe Mayor vows crackdown to enforce labour, immigration laws
The Ndwedwe Local Municipality has vowed to enforce immigration and labour laws after local farms and shops were found to be exploiting foreign nationals as cheap labour.
On Tuesday, a multi-disciplinary team led by Public Works Deputy Minister Sihle Zikalala inspected the area after receiving several complaints during a previous visit.
He went with officials from the Departments of Labour, Home Affairs, and the South African Police Service.
He says they visited three farms and a shopping centre which revealed that many workers were undocumented.
Workers lacked any form of benefits and were not earning the minimum wage
However, Mayor Samuel Mfeka says this issue also affects South Africans, who are similarly exploited due to being paid less.
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He also says its concerning that many South Africans are unemployed while these businesses continue to hire foreign nationals who have no documents.
Mfeka says they will be working with the Labour Department and Home Affairs.
" They're going to assist us to make sure that these farm workers are protected and also the farm owners, because we don't have challenges with the farm owners, we don't have problems with them as such, but they're doings are causing problems because when you go and hire an illegal immigrant, while you've got so much South Africans that are unemployed, definitely you are inviting a problem to yourself.
"These officials that we have brought, they're going to assist us in making sure that everybody is safe and every rule and policy are implemented."
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