In Conversation With Mpho Makhubela Lawyers for Human Rights
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the undersigned organizations, stand together in deep outrage at the conduct of the Department of Home Affairs during its so-called "Operation New Broom," the recent immigration raid conducted at Plastic View informal settlement on 23 May 2025. The mass arrest and detention of over 90 individuals, including vulnerable persons such as children, pregnant women, and asylum seekers, marks a troubling descent into the kind of repressive state practices reminiscent of South Africa’s apartheid past.
This operation, and others like it, bear a chilling resemblance to the trauma of forced removals that defined the apartheid regime. During that era, the State used its full might to descend upon Black working-class communities, townships, and informal settlements, where families were forcefully separated, children were taken from their parents, and people were moved like cargo without regard to dignity or humanity. Today, we see these practices return in the form of aggressive, dehumanising immigration operations which the Department refers to as “sweeps”—language that reduces human beings to rubbish, implying they are something to be discarded. That such language and actions are now used by a government claiming democratic legitimacy is an affront to our constitutional values.
This operation, and others like it, bear a chilling resemblance to the trauma of forced removals that defined the apartheid regime. During that era, the State used its full might to descend upon Black working-class communities, townships, and informal settlements, where families were forcefully separated, children were taken from their parents, and people were moved like cargo without regard to dignity or humanity. Today, we see these practices return in the form of aggressive, dehumanising immigration operations which the Department refers to as “sweeps”—language that reduces human beings to rubbish, implying they are something to be discarded. That such language and actions are now used by a government claiming democratic legitimacy is an affront to our constitutional values.
