Hot on the heels of the French Trade Advisors call for an urgent solution to the extreme delays by the Department of Home Affairs with regards to the processing of visas Business Leadership South Africa (BLSA) has reiterated the calls that the present situation cannot be allowed to continue.

BLSA was commenting on the experiences of the French Trade Advisors whose member companies are having significant problems with the processing of their work visas for skilled staff that they need to work in South Africa. The work visas of their staff (that possess scarce skills and experience) have not been processed and they are faced with the situation where the companies must delay their investment in South Africa and even consider relocating their African operations to countries outside of South Africa.

BLSA expressed the concerns of many when it said that whilst it understood that the problem started when the processing of visas was centralized it could not understand where the root of the problem stemmed from – whether it was a management failure, xenophobia or some kind of political dysfunction. The bottom line though is that it could not continue as it was having a catastrophic effect on the ability of businesses to deal with the skills shortage and was holding back foreign investment and growth.

BLSA lamented the fact that while business had made good progress in working with government to find the skills to deal with the energy crisis, it was now faced with a serious government dysfunction that would make this difficult to implement. It called upon government to deal with its bureaucratic and regulatory functions in an efficient and proper manner.

This issue is of course not confined to work visas, but every single type of visa category is being affected.