100 Afrikaners getting closer to the 'American dream'
The New York Times reports that 100 Afrikaners have been identified and could be approved for refugee status in the United States.
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702's Clement Manyathela is joined by Craig Smith, an immigration lawyer at Craig Smith & Associates.
Listen below:
A rather modest 100 Afrikaners could be headed to the United States as refugees after being identified as potentially meeting the qualifications.
Following his claims that 'terrible things' are happening in South Africa, with Afrikaners as the victims, US President Donald Trump signed an executive order in February in which he promised to:
"Promote the resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation."
Since then, reports abound about the number of Afrikaners offering to take Trump up on his (as yet detail-lacking) offer.
Some reports suggested that over 17,000 'enquiries' were made within days of the order.
However this week, a New York Times article seemed to shed a little more light on what is apparently being labelled 'Project South Africa' by Washington.
And it seems that, as things currently stand, there have been around 8,200 requests to resettle in the US.
"... those individuals who are outside of their country of nationality, who have a well-founded fear of persecution as a result of race, religion, nationality, political opinion, or a social group who feel they are being persecuted..."
- Craig Smith, Immigration lawyer - Craig Smith & Associates
But US legislation also makes provision, in certain circumstances, for the President to identify other groups, outside of the standard definition, that he deems should also be offered refugee status.
"What the executive order has done is, it has essentially set up that [you could qualify] if you fall within a group of Afrikaners who have suffered racial discrimination."
- Craig Smith, Immigration lawyer - Craig Smith & Associates
On Wednesday it was reported that the US intends to rent office space in Pretoria in which to set up refugee centres to process the application of those Afrikaners looking to head Stateside.
ALSO READ: 17k enquire about getting refugee status - SA Chamber of Commerce in the USA
"It's still in its very tentative stages."
- Craig Smith, Immigration lawyer - Craig Smith & Associates
ALSO READ: Afrikaners are 'winning the victimhood Olympics' - Johan Erasmus, Betereinders
ALSO READ: Staying put: 'Afrikaners are Africans! We want to make a difference here' - FF Plus
Scroll up to listen to the conversation from The Clement Manythela Show.