1. The government does not have a precise number of the number of undocumented immigrants in Republic due to the clandestine nature of the act of being here illegally. A number of persons entered without being recorded on any system and live here as unrecorded. It is only when they are detected or their presence is noted that we are able to have figures. The number of undocumented migrants that were deported in 2019/20 was 29376 with the nationality breakdown as follows:
Mozambique |
13834 |
Pakistan |
32 |
Burundi |
15 |
Bolivia |
6 |
Zimbabwe |
5790 |
Zambia |
31 |
Ethiopia |
13 |
Algeria |
3 |
Malawi |
4277 |
China |
29 |
Botswana |
11 |
Cape Verde |
3 |
Lesotho |
3963 |
India |
29 |
Cameroon |
11 |
Senegal |
3 |
Tanzania |
517 |
Bangladesh |
26 |
Thailand |
11 |
Bulgaria |
2 |
Eswatini |
314 |
Ghana |
25 |
Brazil |
10 |
Guyana |
2 |
Nigeria |
176 |
Angola |
22 |
Congo-Brazzaville |
10 |
Iraq |
2 |
DRC |
87 |
Kenya |
21 |
Somalia |
8 |
Sri Lanka |
2 |
Uganda |
50 |
Namibia |
19 |
Egypt |
7 |
UK |
2 |
Spain |
1 |
Saudi Arabia |
1 |
Saint Vincent |
1 |
Peru |
1 |
Venezuela |
2 |
Cuba |
1 |
Gabon |
1 |
Morocco |
1 |
Cote d’Voire |
1 |
Ecuador |
1 |
Israel |
1 |
Palestine |
1 |
and in 2020/21 deportations dropped with the onset of the Covid pandemic and stood at 14859 the breakdown as follows:
Lesotho |
5769 |
Kenya |
5 |
Zimbabwe |
3226 |
UK |
4 |
Mozambique |
2714 |
Botswana |
3 |
Malawi |
2019 |
China |
3 |
Eswatini |
622 |
Thailand |
3 |
Tanzania |
236 |
Cameroon |
2 |
Nigeria |
59 |
Guinea |
2 |
DRC |
51 |
Paraguay |
2 |
Namibia |
24 |
Philippines |
2 |
Angola |
23 |
Argentina |
1 |
Burundi |
19 |
Bolivia |
1 |
Brazil |
13 |
Bulgaria |
1 |
Uganda |
9 |
Germany |
1 |
Zambia |
8 |
Guyana |
1 |
Pakistan |
1 |
||
Seychelles |
1 |
||
Sierra Leone |
1 |
||
USA |
1 |
2. The department is mandated by legislation to enforce immigration act and deport illegal immigrants. This activity continues unabated as reflected in response to question 1 above.
END