South Africa’s Department of Home Affairs has launched the first phase of a new Digital Asylum System, an online portal where people seeking asylum record their intention to apply by uploading facial biometrics, personal information and supporting documents. The portal is live for a first batch of test cases and will open to the public after the department’s next scheduled software release this coming weekend. The department had targeted a November launch for the platform.
Registration runs through the department’s online services site, Myhomeaffairsonline.dha.gov.za. Applicants receive a receipt confirming their declared intention to seek asylum, but the department said the receipt is not a formal asylum application and confers no status on the applicant. Registering an intention also does not provide blanket protection against immigration enforcement, and deportations will continue in accordance with the law. People without a device or internet access can get help at Refugee Reception Offices.
Home Affairs said the portal gives effect to a Constitutional Court judgment of July 7, 2026, and extends a digital transformation program that already includes South Africa’s biometric Electronic Travel Authorisation system. For now the portal only records intentions, which the department said will help it gauge application volumes and plan capacity.
Later phases will add appointment scheduling, additional biometric verification, checks against existing Home Affairs records and full digitization of applications and appeals. The department plans to use machine learning and AI tools to clear a decades-old backlog of asylum appeals and cut the time needed to decide new cases, which it said would allow swift deportation of the 95 percent of applicants it says are routinely rejected.
“The end-to-end digitalisation of the asylum seeker process presents a major opportunity to finally end the long-standing abuse of this system,” said Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber. He said delays had been caused by years of underfunding and staff shortages, and that at the start of the current administration the department had only nine officials to handle thousands of outstanding appeals.
“Over the next few months, we will roll out subsequent phases of this project until the time required to adjudicate an asylum application and appeal is dramatically reduced,” Schreiber said.
Sources: South African Government
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By the ID Tech Editorial Team
