IN PICS | ‘Karma will get Jacinta,’ says refugee as home affairs moves 278 people to Lindela
That was the parting shot to March and March founder Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma from Princess Adjei, spokesperson for a group of refugees who lived outside the home affairs office on Che Guevara Road in Durban for the past four months, as they prepared to board a bus to the Lindela repatriation centre in Gauteng on Tuesday.
About 400 people, mainly from the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Burundi and Rwanda, who lived in the temporary, makeshift camp under difficult conditions with a few mobile toilets, came under attack from March and March in the past two weeks.
A protest on September 3 descended into chaos, with police using teargas and rubber bullets to disperse protesters during a tense confrontation with the migrants. At least three people were injured and one person was arrested.
Last Thursday about 300 March and March members gathered in Durban again, led by Ngobese-Zuma, who carried a traditional mat, saying they were prepared to sleep on the road to make their point.
March and March have described the camp as an eyesore and health hazard and claimed some refugees were criminals who robbed businesses, homes and pedestrians in the area.
Businesses in the area also said the refugees had negatively affected their trading and called for the government to rehome them to provide safe, secure and hygienic living conditions.
Spokesperson Ndileka Cola said the order was given by the interministerial committee (IMC) on migration after some of the refugees agreed to relocate to Lindela.
Adjei, who is Congolese and Ghanian, said the refugees were regularly attacked and sworn at, and life was difficult with people getting sick and at least two deaths.
Refugee Princess Adjei who has lived on the street for four months, has chosen to be taken to the Lindela repatriation Centre in Krugersdorp. She says March and March has made their life unbearable . 📹: @sandysndlovu pic.twitter.com/CTM5jaIA6m— Yasantha Naidoo (@NaidooYasantha) September 15, 2026
“It’s been very bad and frustrating. Jacinta and March and March are really bad and hectic. What they have been doing to us is wicked and inhumane.
“I don’t know what kind of a human being Jacinta is, because she’s a mother, and yet she didn’t think about the kids who were living here. She didn’t think about the old women and men. All she wanted was her own selfish reasons to get her agenda. Karma is a b**ch. She will soon find karma.”
She has lived in South Africa since she was a child and has worked as a beautician for several years.
Another refugee, Wivne Bahati, said she was relieved the government had finally heard their pleas to be rehomed to a shelter.
“I’m positive about our future, and I am relieved because we will be able to live without having to think about how we are going to survive on a day-to-day basis. We are refugees and asylum seekers, not illegal immigrants, and we have always asked to be taken to a shelter,” she said.
“It will be hard because we haven’t been working for four months and we need something to take there, to pay rent,” she said. “Some of us have lost everything — it was either stolen or lost on the streets.”