Traffic at Beitbridge port of entry. Picture: Timothy Bernard/Independent Newspapers
The Border Management Authority (BMA) has revealed that it processed more than 1 136 250 travellers across the country’s 71 ports of entry over Easter.
BMA commissioner Mike Masiapato said on Sunday that this represented a 24% increase, or 222 391 more travellers, than last year.
This as Masiapato announced the results of the 10-day Easter plan implementation that ran from March 26 to April 4.
Masiapato said BMA authorities intercepted 3 841 people trying to enter the country illegally during this period. Most were caught trying to enter without documents and were deported.
Of the 3 841, 2 403 did not have any documents, 1 019 were refused entry for being “undesirable”, and 419 were refused entry for other reasons.
Masiapato added that the BMA also processed 36 675 private vehicles, 1 893 minibus taxis, 1 309 buses, and more than 2 621 aircraft.
He said the BMA also handled 252 ships, 119 of which were making crew changes through the off-port limit mechanism.
“This has to do with the facilitation of crew changes for vessels that have not docked at the port. During the implementation of this plan on people movement, we deployed proactive preventative measures for the speedy detection of non-compliances on the set port protocols.”
According to Masiapato, most of the “inadmissible” individuals had invalid passports, fraudulent visas or simply failed to produce relevant documents such as valid yellow fever certificates.
“We would like to indicate that the success of this Easter operation can be attributed to the consistent implementation of all proactive measures and those include effective corridor management which was done in full collaboration with the respective local traffic authorities. As such, none of our key arteries leading to any of the land ports of entry experienced any kind of congestion,” he said.
The Star
siyabonga.sithole@inl.co.za