Overview
- Thousands of people marched on Tuesday in Johannesburg, Pretoria, Durban and other towns under a large police deployment while most rallies were reported as largely peaceful.
- Organizers set a self‑declared June 30 ultimatum calling for irregular migrants to leave the country, a date with no legal basis that helped mobilize the mass demonstrations.
- Police made arrests for isolated looting and attempted attacks, closed some business districts and warned those who commit crimes during protests will face prosecution.
- The wave of attacks since April has driven roughly 25,000 people to flee South Africa and prompted repatriation operations by Nigeria, Ghana and Malawi that have returned thousands of citizens.
- President Cyril Ramaphosa met protest leaders to urge calm and acknowledged border‑control failures while the country’s high unemployment and a history of deadly xenophobic outbreaks raise the risk of further escalation.