In the past few weeks, attacks on foreign workers in South Africa has been on the increase with Nigerian owned business being the worst hit by these attacks in South Africa.
While the tensions raised by the recent xenophobic attacks on Nigerians living in South Africa are yet to fizzle out, the Nigeria government and its citizens at home are calling for justice and for appropriate sanctions on South Africa and its business in Nigeria that have been repatriating billions of dollars from the Nigeria economy and also for compensation on property and lives that has been destroyed in the series of xenophobic attacks.
The violence which has resulted in reprisal attacks against South African firms in Nigeria and the temporary closure of South Africa’s diplomatic missions in Lagos and Abuja has forced the South African government to sit up in their duty of protecting of lives and property of not only South Africans but foreign nationals in their country.
These latest development and various reprisal attacks on South Africa owned business in Nigeria, prompted the South Africa government on Monday, to send a special envoy to meet with President Muhammadu Buhari, to apologise over the recent attacks on foreign nationals in its country.
The leader of the envoy Mr. Jeff Radabe, while tendering the South African leader apology to Nigeria, stated that “The incident does not represent what we stand for, and South African police would “leave no stone unturned, that those involved must be brought to book.”
“We are here to convey our President sincere apologise about the recent incidents that have transpired in South Africa, those incidents do not represent what we stand for as constitutional democracy in South Africa.”
Meanwhile, the Nigerian government in the last few days has commenced repatriation of its nationals in South Africa back home with another batch of 320 Nigeria nationals expected to arrive Tuesday night.