Two ex-Home Affairs officials arrested over passports sold for R100 000 each
The department says the pair used a manual 'photo swapping' loophole to issue South African passports carrying foreign nationals' photographs, and that biometric verification now closes it.
Two former Home Affairs employees have been arrested over a syndicate that fraudulently issued South African passports to foreign nationals for up to R100 000 each, the department said.
The pair allegedly worked a loophole in an outdated manual process known as “photo swapping”, using the identity details of legitimate South African citizens to obtain passports bearing photographs of foreign nationals.
The arrests follow a joint investigation by the department’s Counter Corruption Unit and the Hawks, which uncovered the syndicate in 2022, according to SAnews, the South African Government News Agency (https://www.sanews.gov.za/south-africa/two-former-home-affairs-employees-arrested-fraudulently-issuing-passports). The account is a departmental summary of the case rather than the court record, and the former officials have not been named.
Home Affairs said its digital reforms now link applicants to their identities throughout the application process, including when photographs are captured, closing the loophole that previously allowed a foreign national’s photograph to be substituted for that of a South African citizen. The same approach underpins the department’s Digital Partnership with banks, which it says is expanding access to Smart ID Cards through secure, digitally integrated processes.
“This case is a powerful example of why we are digitally transforming Home Affairs,” the department said.
Home Affairs Minister Dr Leon Schreiber said outdated manual processes had for years created loopholes that criminal syndicates could exploit to fraudulently obtain South African passports.
“Through our digital transformation, we are closing these loopholes by introducing secure biometric verification and automated systems that remove opportunities for human manipulation,” he said.
“Our reforms are not simply about making Home Affairs faster and more convenient. They are about fundamentally changing how the department operates so that fraud and corruption are prevented by design, rather than detected only after the damage has been done.”
The department said that by automating identity verification and reducing human discretion it is systematically removing opportunities for corruption across its systems. Since the start of the seventh administration, 98 Home Affairs officials have been dismissed and 42 have been arrested as part of what it describes as a sustained crackdown on corruption.
Schreiber commended the Counter Corruption Unit and the Hawks for their work on the case.
