I give up with home affairs :(

I am sharing this story in the hope of others being aware of this issue and perhaps somehow, one never knows, all our cries get to the ears of someone that actually wants to help. My husband is a foreigner and has been in the country now for 20 years. After paying a lot of money and going legal all the way he eventually got his Permanent residence document. Now he wants to apply for his ID. You would think 20 years in a country, paying personal and company tax and vat would make it easy. We go to home affairs and are told we need the original document signed at our wedding in 2009.

This is the same document that home affairs has in pretoria. So we now need to work for home affairs and find THEIR document. They told him without this his application cannot be processed. This document, along with the marriage register book was given to home affairs by the marriage officer. Now they say it takes up to a year to get this document - some have been waiting for years.

We are loyal citizens, we pay tax and vat and have done everything the legal way. That being said, it now makes sense why people do things *******ly. Cant blame them. Our documents are life.

Please can someone from DHA explain to me why people have to go find a document that belongs to them? This is the most ridiculous things Ive ever heard. Should these not be on a computerized system so that it appears when they punch in your Id number. Goodness knows what happens if the store room burns down with all our documents. Why do we have to prove to home affairs that we are married when they printed out a marriage certificate for us??????????

If you ask me this is just another tactic to discourage foreigners from taking up residence in SA. People that have been here for 20 years should not be treated like this.