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Viewing cable 08JOHANNESBURG180, EASING OF SOUTH AFRICAN BLANK-PASSPORT-PAGE REQUIREMENT FOR

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Reference ID Created Released Classification Origin
08JOHANNESBURG180 2008-11-03 16:14 2011-08-24 01:00 UNCLASSIFIED Consulate Johannesburg
R 031614Z NOV 08
FM AMCONSUL JOHANNESBURG
TO SECSTATE WASHDC 6319
INFO AMEMBASSY PRETORIA 
AMCONSUL CAPE TOWN 
AMCONSUL DURBAN 
AMEMBASSY WINDHOEK 
AMEMBASSY GABORONE 
AMCONSUL JOHANNESBURG
UNCLAS JOHANNESBURG 000180 
 
 
FOR CA/OCS/ACS 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: CPAS CASC CMGT PREL PGOV SF
SUBJECT: EASING OF SOUTH AFRICAN BLANK-PASSPORT-PAGE REQUIREMENT FOR 
U.S. CITIZENS 
 
REF: 07 JOHANNESBURG 79 
 
1.  Summary:  South African Home Affairs authorities have agreed 
that arriving U.S. citizens who have no blank pages marked 
"Visas" in their passports, as is normally required for entry 
into South Africa, may be processed for admission on available 
pages marked "Endorsements" or "Amendments and Endorsements." 
Turnarounds of Amcits at South African ports of entry have 
dropped off dramatically as a result of this change, a welcome 
development for Amcit travelers as well as for consular sections 
and duty officers at the four South Africa posts. End Summary. 
 
2.  As reported reftel, consular staffs in Johannesburg, Cape 
Town and Durban, as well as duty officers at those posts and the 
Embassy in Pretoria, have wrestled for years with the effects of 
a South African regulation requiring visa-exempt visitors from 
the United States and other countries to have at least one blank 
"visa" page in their passports in order to be admissible into 
South Africa. Prior to September 2008, in Johannesburg alone, as 
many as 15-20 turnarounds/detentions came to our attention as a 
result of this regulation, and there were no doubt many other 
cases about which we were never notified. 
 
3.  On September 12, 2008, following approval from the 
Department, the Embassy advised the SAG via a diplomatic note 
that for purposes of entry into South Africa the USG considered 
pages marked "Endorsements" or "Amendments and Endorsements" in 
U.S. passports to be equivalent to pages marked "Visas." The 
following week, a contact at the Department of Home Affairs 
(DHA) advised us informally that all South African ports of 
entry (POEs) were being instructed to process arriving Amcits as 
necessary on the endorsement pages in their passports if the 
visa pages were all used up.  In a diplomatic note dated October 
1, the Department of Foreign Affairs confirmed that "the request 
by the Embassy to use pages marked 'endorsement' and 'amendments 
and endorsements' has been acceded to" by DHA, and that the DHA 
"will also advise all officials at ports of entry accordingly." 
 
4.  Posts in South Africa have been monitoring compliance with 
the new policy over the past six weeks, and in that time not a 
single passport-pages turnaround has come to the attention of 
our ACS units, with the exception of one case from early 
November involving an Amcit who had neither blank visa pages nor 
endorsement pages (a rare occurrence). As we head into the busy 
summer season and look forward to the 2010 soccer World Cup that 
will be hosted by South Africa, far fewer American tourists and 
business travelers will be inconvenienced by South Africa's 
insistence on one -- or sometimes two -- blank passport pages, 
with obvious benefits as well for our consular sections and duty 
officers at all four posts in South Africa. 
 
5.  The Mission does not intend to amend information available 
to the public and travel industry regarding the need  to have 
two blank visa pages to comply with the relevant South African 
regulation. We have agreed with DHA that the liberalized 
interpretation of the regulation should be seen as an 
extraordinary measure for those situations only where travelers 
have no blank visa pages left in their passports. To avoid 
confusion on the part of the traveling public, airlines and 
travel agents, and to limit how often this extraordinary measure 
has to be applied, we do not want to advertise its availability 
too loudly or openly, or we would run the risk of giving our 
audience the false impression that routine South African 
requirements for travelers have been modified when in fact they 
have not been. 
 
6.  Post wishes to express its appreciation to our colleagues in 
the Department, in particular CA/OCS/ACS, CA/OCS/PRI and CA/PPT, 
for agreeing to the limited use of passport "endorsement" pages 
for purposes of South African entry processing. 
 
PASSEN