No Zambian affected by xenophobia, says government
…yet a terrified Zambian single mother and her 2 daughters were attacked and fled Cape Town
By Kanyanta Chanda Kapwepwe
THE statement by recently acting foreign affairs minister Princess Kasune that “no Zambian has been affected by Xenophobia in South Africa” is not only detached from reality, but also painfully insulting to struggling Zambian families who have already suffered silently across South Africa.
How can the government confidently declare that no Zambian has been affected when there is already a heartbreaking case in Cape Town involving a vulnerable Zambian single mother and her two daughters, a story so traumatic that members of the Zambian community themselves had to step in and rescue the family after the system completely failed them? This is a mother and her children living through fear, violence, detention, humiliation, and eventually fleeing Cape Town.
According to information circulating within the Zambian community in Cape Town, the woman and her two daughters were attacked in March 2026, in the middle of the night, while sleeping in their home. Imagine the terror of two little girls waking up in darkness to violence surrounding their mother. Imagine a single mother in a foreign country, trying to protect her daughters while facing danger herself. Those are scars children do not simply forget.
But the most shocking part of the story is what happened next. Instead of protection, the following morning, the South African police reportedly arrested the Zambian mother herself over what was described as a “reported case of assault” linked to the previous night’s incident. The victim suddenly became the accused. The mother of two daughters was thrown into custody and reportedly spent close to two months in detention without bail.
For nearly two months, those children effectively lost their mother to a prison cell in a foreign country. Where was the Zambian government? Where was the embassy? Where were the emergency consular interventions we are now hearing about in Parliament?
Because what eventually saved that family was not the government. It was ordinary struggling Zambians in Cape Town who contributed money from their own pockets to rescue fellow citizens abandoned by the very institutions meant to protect them. Community members reportedly mobilised transport and survival support until the woman and her daughters finally returned to Zambia during the first week of May 2026.
So, when government officials stand in Parliament and confidently state that “no Zambian has been affected,” many people will understandably ask: What exactly does the government mean by “affected”? Must a Zambian first die before the government recognises suffering? Must there be viral videos of burning houses before the embassy acknowledges danger? Must children become statistics before officials stop speaking in diplomatic comfort language?
If a single mother loses her safety, loses her freedom, loses nearly two months with her daughters, loses her livelihood, and is eventually forced to seek voluntary deportation just to escape the ordeal, then what else qualifies as being “affected”?
The deeper concern is that this may only be one known story among many untold ones. Many migrants are suffering quietly in overcrowded townships, informal settlements, and vulnerable communities where survival itself has become the priority. The absence of officials does not mean the absence of pain. It simply means the victims have stopped expecting help.
What makes the ministerial statement even more troubling is that government simultaneously claimed that it had “heightened monitoring”, was working closely with communities, and had established emergency coordination systems through the Zambian mission in Pretoria. Yet somehow, a traumatised Zambian mother with two daughters could allegedly pass through violence, arrest, detention, court appearances, voluntary deportation, and community fundraising without becoming visible to the “heightened monitoring” system.
It’s either that the system being described to Parliament is a lie, not functioning effectively, or the government genuinely does not know what many Zambians in South Africa are going through.
And if government does not know, then government should not be dismissing the fears and experiences of its own citizens with blanket statements that everything is fine.
Kanyanta Chanda Kapwepwe is a governance analyst and senior lecturer at the Cape Peninsula University of Technology. He writes in his personal capacity.
