Gender issues in the system of classifying refugees in the South African Asylum

1. Bernadette Jardino

2. The South African asylum system
Common crime vs. persecution
Safe/unsafe, peace/war
Culture as Political

3. 2008 Refugees Amendment Act
• „gender‟ as the seventh ground for asylum
• Passed unnoticed
• Only country in the world to include „gender‟ as a
binding ground for asylum

4. (a) Out of fear of persecution for reasons of
race, tribe, religion, nationality, political
opinion or membership of a particular social
group, is outside of their country of their
nationality and is unwilling or unable to give
themselves to the protection of that country,
or, not having a nationality and being outside
the country of their former residence is
unable, or unwilling out of fear, to return to it;
(Refugees Act 1998,3a)

5. (b)Due to external
aggression, occupation, foreign domination
or events seriously disrupting public order
in either part or the whole of their country
of origin or nationality, is compelled to
leave their place of residence and seek
refuge elsewhere. (Refugees Act 1998, 3b)

6. Refugee Status Determination Officers
• Hold the responsibility for deciding on the validity
and credibility of asylum applications in South
Africa
• Had three (3) options:
 Accept the claim
 Unfounded
 Manifestly unfounded

7. Standing
Committee on
Refugee Affairs
RSDO
accept
reject
Rejected
* RSDO are the most crucial actors in the system

8. 1. Lack of adequate official interpretation
2. Backlog of asylum cases and fast
tracking of claims
3. Overburdening of asylum officials
4. Inadequate technology

9. Common crime
• Personal
• Private
Persecution
• Political
• Public forms of violence

10. Asylum seekers often interpret their
experiences of gendered harm as
personal, rather than political
Rape victims, for example, may see their
rape as a personal attack rather than an
example of gender violence (Shuman and
Bohmer 2004).

11. Ugandan asylum seeker:
“Decided not to tell anyone because it is a
shame and it is hurting, and I thought
maybe it is not necessary to mention. The
only question was why I left my country so
I just said the things that I was comfortable
with. And I didn‟t know where those
information were going.”

12.  Chairperson of the Standing Committee:
“ We have a number of domestic violence cases,
but domestic violence is not easily covered by the
definition. So we would get a case where the
woman claims her husband beats her up or her
husband‟s family doesn‟t like her or something like
that, but seeing her as a particular social group
and suffering domestic violence is difficult to
currently bring into the Refugee Act. Those that we
have seen have been decided as manifestly
unfounded.”

13. A member of the Board said:
“ It‟s the same as what you get with female
genital mutilation, we would classify that as
social group and we would allow those
appeals,”

14. Rejection letter of Tazmanian man:
“You said you left you country because of
you r family problems. You said that your
family chased you out because you are a
gay. You also said that...your religion
(Islam) does not accept gays, even your
tribe (Sukuma) doesn‟t.”

15.  A RSDO said,
“You mean she has run away from the country
because her husband is beating her? That claim is
not credible because... I don‟t know the
constitutions of all countries, but anywhere where
someone can be dealt with, they can deal with
that...What did you do before coming to South
Africa? Did your parents know? Did his family
know? Before even you can go to the police.
That‟s really where you need clear information-
about what she did.”

16. Rape during war is violence while rape
during peacetime is seen as common
crime.
They believe that the government has the
capacity to protect the people who
experience such violence during
peacetime

17. FGM: Female Genital Mutilation
Qualified for the asylum because of
culture?
NO.
..because FGM is foreign to South Africa