Anti-immigrant protesters draped in flags and wielding wooden weapons marched across cities in South Africa yesterday to mark a deadline they had set for undocumented migrants to leave, with some marches hit by violence and looting.
Thousands of African foreign nationals had already fled South Africa ahead of yesterday’s “deadline”, and shops closed and foreign workers stayed home in anticipation of further trouble after months of unrest brought international condemnation.
At least four people have been killed and thousands of foreigners have been driven from their homes and seen their businesses and property vandalised.
The leader of the anti-migrant movement said they would hold weekly marches until their objectives are met.
“For the next six months, we are asking for our national resources to be used to take the illegal immigrants out of this country. From building to building – they must go,” Jacinta Ngobese, leader of the March and March group, said in the port city of Durban.
Migrants have interpreted the deadline as a physical threat, and there were scattered signs of violence, although many marches were peaceful. Police said they had arrested some looters, giving no further details.
In Thembisa, a northern suburb of the main commercial hub of Johannesburg, rioters threw stones at police and suspected migrants, while sporadic gunfire could be heard near the central business district.
National paper the Daily Maverick reported police deploying tactical vehicles and firing shots in Benoni, eastern Johannesburg, after being threatened by 500 protesters.
A police spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment. In the township of Soweto, protesters looted shacks of foreign nationals, national broadcaster SABC reported, adding that police had fired rubber bullets to disperse marches in Pietermaritzburg, near Durban.
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