1928818 (Refugee)

This matter concerned an application for review of a decision to refuse protection visas made by the applicants, who are White South African citizens. The applicants claimed they had a well-founded fear of persecution in South Africa due to their ethnicity, citing experiences of abduction, robbery, threats by corrupt police, and general violence and corruption within the country. They also argued that as white South Africans, they were at a heightened risk of financially motivated crime, exacerbated by government incentives to employ Black South Africans, which had led to the first applicant's retrenchment.

The court was required to determine whether the applicants had a well-founded fear of persecution for one of the five prescribed reasons under section 5J(1) of the Migration Act 1958 (Cth), and if there was a real chance of persecution upon return to South Africa. Alternatively, the court had to consider whether there were substantial grounds for believing that, as a necessary and foreseeable consequence of removal to South Africa, the applicants faced a real risk of suffering significant harm as defined in section 36(2A) of the Act.

The court considered the documentary evidence, including the applicants' statements, police clearance certificates, social media reports on violence and corruption in South Africa, and a police case file relating to the first applicant's abduction and robbery. The delegate had accepted the first applicant's fears of generalised crime and intimidation by race-based rhetoric but did not accept that white South Africans were specifically targeted due to their ethnicity. Instead, the delegate reasoned that their higher average income might make them more susceptible to financially motivated crime. The delegate was not satisfied that the applicants met the criteria for refugee status or that they faced a real risk of significant harm personally, as opposed to the general population.

The decision under review was remitted.