Starting with a brief overview of the policy framework, the webinar will be an introduction to the world of getting permission for a foreign national to work in South Africa.
This will range from short term work authorizations to long term critical skills work visas. The webinar will also cover those visas which will give the holder permission to work as a secondary activity.
When?
6 November 2026, 9:00 to 11:00
Course outline
There are few countries which are not dealing with the troubled issue of economic migration. But this is a creature ‘with many faces.’ It can be for a temporary period or for permanent purposes. It is not just about visas for people who relocate in search of better economic opportunities in other countries and how they are received and treated by the host country. All too often this category becomes the demonised poster child of migration. Not only is this phenomenon misunderstood but this is but just one aspect of migration.
The Immigration Act, 13 of 2002, acknowledges this human reality.
The reasons for moving from one country to another can include being transferred by your employer, needing to open a branch of an offshore company, identifying and launching a start-up that will employ citizens of the host country. Mindful of the human tragedy of Mozambican workers there are the foreign nationals whom the mines need. Companies often need to recruit seasonal workers. People move to work in academic research or to paint or to write. And let us not forget people who travel for essential or elective medical treatment or who travel to attend conferences or for tourism. There are people who travel to volunteer with humanitarian or environmental projects or to assist with wildlife rehabilitation. There are youngsters who travel for their gap years. There are also the phenomena of providing visas for love that crosses international borders or where family need to be reunited and where those families need to be able to feed themselves. There is also always family unification. It would be a serious omission to forget that – as own history has taught us all too tragically – that people can find themselves forced to flee persecution or conflict. There are the movements of people who come to buy and sell goods and the return home. And then last but not least, there are the people who have had the bravery to realise that their own country cannot feed, educate or provide jobs for its population, whether this be due to the consequences of colonialism, corruption, mismanagement, climate change or plain bad luck.
Providing for and managing these very human phenomena and whether or not permission should be given to allow these foreign nationals to work in South Africa and balancing these ‘realities’ against the desperate unemployment levels in South Africa, is but one aspect of a critical domain of immigration law and of the Department of Home Affairs.
This webinar will focus on the subject of work visas and authorisations which allow work, for people who find themselves in one or other of these many situations.
Presenter
Chris Watters has been in practice for over 40 years. Chris Watters Attorneys was started 37 years ago. The firm handles inward immigration law exclusively. He was on the Immigration Advisory Board from 2003 – 2005. He was appointed to the SA Law Reform Commission’s subcommittee on immigration law reform. He sat on the Immigration Law Committees of both the LSNP and the LSSA for many years. Aside from various High Court judgements over the years, he has obtained five Constitutional Court judgments on the subject of immigration and refugee law. He has been recognised as an expert in SA immigration law in both the UK and US courts. He has regularly lectured on immigration law for LEAD and other NGOs. In addition to speaking at international conferences on SA immigration law, he is a member of the Global Chapter of the American Immigration Lawyers Association.
How much?
R995 per person.
How to sign up
Complete and submit the registration form. You will then be given the payment information. Please note that registrations will not be accepted until payment has been made.
One or two days before the webinar, we will send you the Zoom link.
Registrations close three days before the webinar.
View the advert here.
