ANC wives stranded

A FOUR-WAY row has erupted in Lusaka over the attempts by more than 200 Zambian women married to African National Congress cadres to join their husbands in South Africa.

The women are at loggerheads with the Zambian government, the ANC and the United Nations High Commission for Refugees over what they say is denial of the necessary documentation as well as the legal and financial assistance to join their husbands.

They claim the Zambian government is reluctant to clear them because their marriages are allegedly illegal and government believes they will not cope with the harsh political realities of South Africa.

Government refusal has sparked off a second row between ANC officials in Lusaka and the women who have accused the officials of flouting the movement’s order to repatriate cadres, their spouses and children.

The United Nations High Commission for Refugees is repatriating South African exiles voluntarily but the ANC, with the largest membership, is allegedly denying Zambian women the documents which would enable them to go to South Africa.

The women, most of whose husbands have already been repatriated, complain they are living under deplorable conditions in many of the ANC rented houses.

More than 45 ANC exiles in Zambia have been evicted from council houses in Lusaka and most remaining ANC families have been forced to live with friends and sympathisers.

ANC chief representative in Zambia, Japhet Ndlovu, says the movement is unable to look after the cadres because donors have withdrawn their financial support. Only those officially deployed or working under the Zambian mission can be helped, he says. AIA

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