MPs have accused Home Affairs Minister Leon Schreiber of keeping an adviser from the organisation whose court win forced the department’s asylum directive.
James Chapman, head of advocacy and legal adviser at the Scalabrini Centre of Cape Town, sits on the Minister’s Immigration Advisory Board. The Scalabrini Centre brought the case in which the Constitutional Court struck down parts of the Refugees Act on 7 July.
PA MP Millicent Lorato Mhlanga raised it at the Portfolio Committee on Home Affairs last week.
“You see, Chair, this is the kind of conflict of interest we’re talking about, when we’re talking about the Scalabrini matter leading to the ConCourt judgment. Members of the advisory board who are advising the Minister and litigating against the department at the same time,” Mhlanga said.
The department told the committee it pulled the directive over unintended consequences, national interest and security concerns.
MK MP Sihle Ngubane said the committee had received complaints.
“We’ve raised these issues, Chair, again and again and again, about the number of email addresses and complaints we received about this Scalabrini person who’s sitting in the advisory committee of the Minister, to say, is he advising the Minister on behalf of South Africans or against South Africa?” Ngubane said.
“So it’s clear now they will win cases over and over while they sit with the Minister, instead of advising him how to win cases, how to handle issues of immigration,” said Sihle.
Later in his address he returned to the adviser.
“I’m emphasising, we are concerned about this guy who is representing Scalabrini in the advisory of the Minister. We want to know what value he is adding in the Minister’s advisory, when all the time he’s part of the Minister’s advisory, and all of a sudden he goes and challenges Home Affairs,” Ngubane said.
“We expect that he will add value on the advisory on these things, and that his advice is done correctly and stops people, his entity, taking the Department of Home Affairs to court now and again. Why is that not happening? We want to know why that is not happening.
“We demand, Chair, that the Minister comes to his mind and understands this conflict of interest of these advisory people that he put on the board,” he said.
Home Affairs officials did not respond to the claims at the sitting.
Schreiber appointed Chapman as one of five independent members when he revived the board in April 2025, after it had been dormant for more than a decade.
At the time, Chapman said he looked forward to working closely with government officials to protect the rights of refugees and asylum seekers.
The 7 July ruling led Home Affairs to issue a directive on 28 September ordering refugee reception offices to accept asylum applications from people who entered the country illegally. The department later withdrew it after refugee offices were overwhelmed and violent protests broke out in Durban and Soweto.
The committee is already probing conflicts of interest on the board. It received about 267 public submissions about the board, most about immigration attorney Stefanie de Saude-Darbandi, who sits on the board while representing Chidimma Adetshina against the department.
In August, the committee resolved to seek a legal opinion. Committee chairperson Mosa Steve Chabane said then that “any perceived conflict of interest requires substantive consideration, including solid legal advice.”
The committee said that the concerns should not be dismissed on legal technicalities, and that the opinion could lead to changes to the Immigration Act.
Parliament’s Legal Services briefed the committee on the matter on 30 September. The outcome has not been made public.
Schreiber has defended the board. He said its members advise on immigration matters only, and do not handle individual cases or legal challenges against the state.
Board chairperson Mavuso Msimang has said: “I don’t see a conflict of interest.”