Wanting to move back to South Africa

Although it is probably the case that your permanent residency has lapsed, you should still check with the authorities. And yes, it is difficult to get hold of them.

You will highly likely need a visa of some sort. Why not come on a 90 days renewable tourist or port-of-entry visa?

Is your mother a South African citizen?  Family who are citizens can help your situation tremendously.

no problem for you at all,when you arive at jhb airport you give your pasport and ZA ID book to pasport control and they stamp your pasport with permanent recidence.
I did it after 12 years in 2013

napel wrote:

no problem for you at all,when you arive at jhb airport you give your pasport and ZA ID book to pasport control and they stamp your pasport with permanent recidence.
I did it after 12 years in 2013

This is totally wrong and you should definitely not follow this advice.

tell me way this is totally wrong? if you have a ZA ID book you can go always back,I have a Dutch pasport they stamp it with PR and not a stamp of VAC and that after 12 years!!!!!!!!

napel wrote:

tell me way this is totally wrong? if you have a ZA ID book you can go always back,I have a Dutch pasport they stamp it with PR and not a stamp of VAC and that after 12 years!!!!!!!!

The reason it is wrong is because the person called Taiya above does not know if their permanent residence has lapsed or not. If it has lapsed, they will see this on their system and might turn him/her away. You cannot enter South Africa with an ID book. You must enter with a passport. An old ID book without real PR status is worthless.

I can't believe that you actually entered South Africa after 12 years (your PR should definitely have lapsed) and they even stamped a PR sticker in your passport. You have to first check if your PR is active, and even then you have to be lucky. Maybe because you had a Dutch passport they were more lax. But I can't understand how you still had PR after 12 years.

That is why this is a totally rare case and definitely not good advice for anyone entering South Africa.

First of all you need a passport to travel , you cannot travel with only a ID document!!!!! With a British passport you don't need a visa you can stay for 90 days only get a VAC stamp , if you  South-African ID document is lapsed they don't send you back you only get a VAC stamp in your passport to stay 90 days, if it is not been lapsed you get your PR stamp and you can stay as long as you wish in South-African
I never hear about lapsed ID document  if they are not knowing you are away for a long time or you must told them you are immigrating back to England !!!!!!
It is not only me immigrating back to South-African  but also family and friends of me after 10 to 15 years aboard with non South African passports  and SA ID documents, they all have a stamp in passport of PR
If you ID document is Lapsed you can go with your original  green B1 802 permanent residence form you must have before you applied for your first ID document to home affairs and ask them for a new ID book ( ask the person who apply for your first ID document  if they still have this document)
Two months ago I receive a new ID book from home affairs so there is no mistake with my PR stamp in my passport , my old one from 1995 was catch in the washing machine.
It is also important that the second last number of your ID number is a 8 and not a 9!!!!!!
I test this at myself out so I am knowing about what I am talking .

I've learnt not to argue with people online. If you still don't agree with me, that is fine. We've seen many people lose their PR. We are immigration lawyers and know what we are talking about.

@Napel - Go and read Section 28.c of the immigration act of South Africa.

In plain English:

Holders of a permanent residence permit who leave South Africa, and remain outside the country for a long period of time (usually longer than 3 years), may lose their permanent residence status. It is therefore important to check on the regulations regularly should you currently reside outside South Africa. There have been cases where it was possible to reinstate a lost permanent residence status.

napel wrote:

First of all you need a passport to travel , you cannot travel with only a ID document!!!!! etc, etc

I agree and said this already.

napel wrote:

I never hear about lapsed ID document  if they are not knowing you are away for a long time or you must told them you are immigrating back to England !!!!!!

They know that you are away for a long time. Your exit and entry from SA is recorded. Still, I agree that sometimes they make mistakes which is why the person asking the question above should check their PR status immediately.

napel wrote:

It is not only me immigrating back to South-African  but also family ...etc, etc, etc ...out so I am knowing about what I am talking .

All of this is irrelevant to the matter at hand in my quote above.

To conclude: If you have been outside of SA for longer than 3 years, you must first check your PR status. Chances are good it has lapsed.

ImmigrationSouthAfrica wrote:

I've learnt not to argue with people online.

It took me the longest time to learn that.  But once I did I felt so much better.

How do you check your PR status?