'Passport fee will kill us'

Abuses and crisis in home country also in memorandum.

- Marizka Coetzer

The inflated price of Zimbabwean passports will leave desperate citizens with no choice but to cross the crocodile-infested Limpopo River in search of jobs in South Africa, they say.

Yesterday, a small group of EFF members and Zimbabweans marched from the Union Buildings in Pretoria to the Zimbabwe embassy to handover a memorandum demanding the standardisation of passport fees amid the current crisis in Zimbabwe.

Citizens of Zimbabwe living in SA spokesperson Tapshinga Mogoro said they were not here by choice but due to the circumstances in Zimbabwe.

Mogoro said the march focused on the increase in passport fees, the crisis in Zimbabwe and the abductions, torture and arrests of citizens in Zimbabwe.

"There should be a standard price for a passport in alignment with other states," he said.

Mogoro said over 90% of the people in Zimbabwe were unemployed and couldn't afford R5 000 for a passport to search for greener pastures.