Politically Aweh host KG Mokgadi risks getting smacked when he ventures out to a March and March protest to find out why South Africans are so angry about "illegal foreigners".

With less than four months to go until the 2026 South African municipal elections, Mzansi made all the wrong headlines across the continent this June and July with a series of xenophobic protest marches in our city centres, and deportations of a number of undocumented foreign nationals.

Political parties, activist groups and social media campaigns are increasingly framing migrants as the cause of South Africa's biggest problems. Even state President Cyril Ramaphosa himself joined in the fray when he confidently declared in the 2026 State of the Nation Address this past February that "illegal immigration continues to pose a risk to our security, our stability, and economic progress".

So it must be true.

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Mustn't it?

For this episode of Politically Aweh, KG Mokgadi took to the streets armed only with his trusty mic and his cunning to ask the hard questions: Are South Africans justified to be this angry over migrant workers? Are Malawians stealing our jobs? Are Mozambicans responsible for the rise in crime? Do our citizens not have access to healthcare because Zimbabweans are overburdening the system?

Statistics unearthed by co-host Zoë Human to address these questions indicate that the proportion of immigrants in South Africa is actually...