Where did my appeal go?

<p>My application for permanent residence was rejected at the end of 2015. I appealed within a few days and never heard back from VFS Global. In the last few months I've been calling them. They assured me the matter has been escalated in DHA but time goes by. To be honest, I don’t know what VFS global does. They just collect the documents, send them to DHA and charge a lot of money. In return you get nothing: no assistance, no information, nothing. Since they’re around I have to drive down to Durban from Howick when before I could go to DHA in PMB.</p> <p>I've been in South Africa since September 2005. I've been married since 2011. We've got a 3-year-old child. I've got a business. I employed South Africans. Yet, I'm still on a temporary residence permit. I wouldn't mind if I didn't have to go through the painful process of renewing my permit every 3 years. I wouldn't mind if I didn't need a South African ID for such basic things as a phone or internet contract. All this must be done through my wife. Every time I've got a problem with my phone or my ADSL line I must ask my wife to call them because I'm not the account holder. This is all extremely frustrating to say the least.</p> <p>In 2008, I decided to stay permanently and got my first life partner permit. After 5 years, I could have app**** for permanent residence in 2013, but as I said we married in 2011. Unbeknown to me, there was a strange South African policy, I don’t know if it still exists, where, if you marry, your status changes. It basically meant you lost all that time you’d been in the country and went back to row zero. For DHA I was a newcomer. At the same time DHA told me that I would be automatically eligible for permanence residence if we ever had a child. Not that that was the reason, but that’s what happened in 2014. With what I had been told in mind, I app**** for permanent residence under the relative option. 11 months later I was notified my application had been rejected. I appealed notwithstanding, still unaware that the law had changed some time before my application and having a child was not good enough any longer. I know now and I’m expecting that my appeal will be rejected, but I’d still like to be notified by the DHA. At the same time, in a naïve way, I’m still in hope that my appeal could end up in hands of a kind person who could appreciate my situation and use some discretion.</p>