15 Zimbabwe migrants drown en route to S. Africa

Fifteen Zimbabweans died while trying to cross a crocodile-infested river to neighbouring South Africa, police have said.

The bodies of the border jumpers were retrieved from the Limpopo River by South African and Zimbabwean police on Thursday.

Some of the bodies had reportedly been hidden in a cave by crocodiles.

“We have sent in our details to South Africa with some relatives who claimed to have lost their loved ones to verify the actual number of people who drowned,” a Zimbabwean police spokesperson Chief Superintendent Patrick Majuta was quoted saying on Friday.

“We are also appealing to those with missing relatives to come forward for possible identification of the bodies.”

Thousands of Zimbabweans risk their lives every year trying to cross to South Africa to seek elusive jobs.

The porous border is also used by people from the Horn of Africa (Ethiopia and Somalia), Democratic Republic of Congo, Pakistan and Mozambique.

Last month 23 Zimbabweans died at an abandoned mine near Johannesburg in South Africa while digging for gold illegally.

An estimated three million Zimbabweans have sought refugee in South Africa in the last decade escaping the country’s worsening economic problems.

Most of the economic refugees are in South Africa illegally and constant deportations have failed to bring the numbers down.

The majority of the immigrants resort to informal jobs because of lack of proper documents in South Africa, the region’s economic powerhouse.

In 2009, South Africa gave thousands of Zimbabwean illegal immigrants work and residency permit under a new dispensation due to expire in November this year.

The African economic giant says it expects Zimbabweans to return to their country to re-apply for new permits.

However, groups representing exiles are threatening to go to court to challenge the government’s decision arguing that Zimbabwe is still unstable economically and politically for the to return.