Concerns over a new visa designed to attract qualified workers in South Africa

After a spate of announcements aimed at attracting talented workers to South Africa, including a remote working visa, experts have expressed doubt about their viability.

President Cyril Ramaphosa emphasised the need for more qualified employees in the country during his most recent State of the Nation Address (SONA). He reaffirmed SONA 2022 pledges, saying the nation was working on ways to implement a new remote working visa to allow vital talents to enter the country and work here temporarily.

According to Marisa Jacobs, managing director of Xpatweb, such a visa would benefit organisations looking to recruit rare skills. She cautioned, however, that implementing the core suggestions is critical for meaningful change to occur as quickly as possible.

“Whatever the improvements we can hope for, employers needed them yesterday,” she said.

According to Xpatweb’s most recent annual essential skills study, more than 80% of organisations struggle to hire talent locally and must rely on offshore sources.

Importantly, despite the mention of a remote working visa, no more details or a timetable have been offered. The Department of Home Affairs has similarly made little headway in implementing the visas.

The new visa would change fundamental immigration procedures to allow for visa extensions for particular activities beyond 90 days.

“Apart from attracting the foreign income of digital nomads, the visa could serve as an incentive to foreign candidates whose spouse wishes to continue working remotely for their overseas employer,” Xpatweb said.

In addition to the new remote worker visa, Ramaphosa proposed the following:

To attract talented immigrants, a more flexible point-based system is needed.

A points-based system, such as the one used in Canada, gives points to several factors such as education level, years of experience, wealth, and so on.

“If the accumulated points pass a minimum threshold, a candidate qualifies to enter the country,” said Jacobs.

Making this more flexible will enable for more qualified individuals to be admitted more quickly.

A reputable employer plan to facilitate the immigration procedure for wealthy investors

The Department of Home Affairs (DHA) had established its Corporate Accounts Unit in 2014, committed to serving South African corporations and multinationals.

“This certainly seems like an extension of that function to make it easier for these companies who need to bring in skills regularly and on an ongoing basis, so it is an extremely good development,” said Jacobs.

A bleak outlook

According to Jacobs, the ideas’ reality are considerably bleaker than they set out to be.

For example, she stated that there was a significant backlog as a result of the Central Adjudication system failing in 2022, leaving a huge number of ex-pats without visas.

Furthermore, Jacobs stated that a tightening of the immigration rules over the previous year has made obtaining a work visa considerably more difficult, and that applications are now taking much longer to be completed.

According to Jacobs, rejection rates have likewise reached their peak in the previous 15 years, frequently for spurious reasons.

According to the managing director, execution is critical to the success of new initiatives aimed at attracting qualified individuals for these and other reasons.