Home Affairs’ reaction to the case of the 15-year-old girl who tried to flee South Africa to join the Islamic State is “a desperate attempt to find some pro-PR spin” on the implementation of new immigration regulations.

This is the view of Michael Tatalias, consultant with the Caracalla Group and former SATSA CEO, who commented on Tourism Update, that Home Affairs was risking destroying the tourism industry “for a really flimsy excuse for needing draconian and ill-thought-out regulations”.

On Easter Sunday a girl was taken off a domestic flight at Cape Town International Airport after her relatives contacted authorities reporting her disappearance. Following the incident, Home Affairs released a statement saying the requirement for unabridged birth certificates and written permission for travelling children under the age of 18 were meant to help curb “horrendous incidents of this nature”.

Spokesperson for Home Affairs, Mayihlome Tshwete, told Tourism Update Home Affairs officials at airports had to deal with unaccompanied minors “all the time”. They regularly saw single parents emigrating with children, while the other parent was not aware of this, as well as people who were “pretending” to be a parent, he said. “From the moment the new law is passed, officials will be able to check all this.” He did not explain why an unabridged birth certificate would prevent this.

“It is right to focus on the issue of human trafficking and there are many different ways of approaching it but what’s happening in South Africa is using a blunt instrument to address a very complex problem, which is having very real and tangible negative effects for the travel and tourism industry,” David Scowsill, President and CEO of the WTTC (World Travel and Tourism Council), said earlier this year.

Tourism Minister, Derek Hanekom, requested a further extension of the implementation of the new rules to enable discussions. “We cannot sweep under the carpet the fact that our current visa regulations are widely seen as a significant obstacle to increasing travel to our country,” he said.

But an extension is unlikely. Tshwete said although there would be an expert panel meeting later this month, as it stands the unabridged birth certificate is set to come into effect on June 1, as previously stipulated. “We have already postponed the new immigration regulations. We can’t postpone them indefinitely. And to what end? For what reason? Are you telling me that human trafficking will be postponed while we postpone the new regulations? No.”

With regard to this particular incident, the girl was stopped from boarding the domestic flight due to family intervention. Had she arrived at OR Tambo she would have been allowed to board an international flight as teenagers travel on ‘adult’ tickets and generally don’t qualify for special attention, says Iata spokesperson Chris Goater. “Therefore, they can be allowed on board without special permission. There are no international regulations that will say that teenagers can’t travel on their own; it’s down to the individual states.”

However, Goater also points out that the requirement of a birth certificate would only ensure the identity of the passenger and would not govern the reason they are flying and whether their reasons are questionable, such as in this case.

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The requirement for parental consent for minors travelling is not uncommon. For example, The Netherlands also requires minors to carry written permission from their parents or guardians when travelling alone. However, the EU has questioned the efficiency of these requirements. A 2012 European Commission study on the requirements specific to children travelling alone or accompanied, legally entering or leaving the member states, shows that “it is not possible to conclude whether children are better protected in the countries where parental authorisation forms are in use”. The study explains that most border guards pointed out that parental authorisation forms were easy to forge.