Mozambique says five citizens killed in South Africa 'xenophobic attack'

The Mozambican government said in a statement late on Monday that five of its citizens were killed in “xenophobic attacks” in South Africa over the weekend.

It said around 800 Mozambican nationals were caught up in the violence that broke out in the southern coastal city of Mossel Bay on Friday.

The region has seen protests against illegal migrants similar to demonstrations that have swept across South Africa in recent weeks.

Maputo’s press office said another two people had died in a road accident as they travelled in a private vehicle back to Mozambique.

The violence prompted about 300 Mozambicans to return home by their own means on Saturday, the statement said.

"The remaining just over 500 have since been sheltered in a safe location in the Western Cape Province, and as of today, 1 June, the process of their repatriation to Mozambique is already underway," it said.

South African police say they are investigating the deaths of two men at an informal settlement in Mossel Bay, some 380 kilometres east of Cape Town, where xenophobic attacks had been reported.

They did not say whether the deaths were linked to the protests or what nationality the two men were.

But the area mayor, Dirk Kotze, voiced "deep concern and dismay at the current xenophobic attacks where people have been murdered, houses burned, and families displaced".

Amid South Africa’s high unemployment and economic difficulties, anti-immigrant sentiment has surged to historic levels in recent months.

"People are frustrated," said Braam Hanekom, director of Passop (People against Suffering, Oppression and Poverty), a Cape Town non-profit organisation that supports asylum seekers, refugees, and immigrants.

"It's hard to fight for jobs. It's hard to fix the economy. It's hard to create opportunities. It's very easy to blame someone, but it's hard to blame the elected leadership who have the majority of support on the ground. "

"It's much easier to find a soft target to express your frustrations, whatever those frustrations are, and foreign nationals are the soft target that frustrated communities have chosen to pick on."

Accused of flooding the country, foreigners in fact make up just four per cent of the population nationally, according to a recent study by the Wits University-based Migrating for Work Research Consortium.

It also found that foreign workers were more likely to take jobs South Africans are not willing to do, or to start their own business: 21 per cent were self-employed, 11 per cent were employers.

The country has faced recurring waves of xenophobic violence since 2008, when dozens of migrants were killed and thousands displaced in attacks across the country.

One citizen-led group, March and March, has issued an ultimatum for illegal migrants to be expelled from the country by 30 June.