FALSE: South Africa is not seeking more than 1000 buses to repatriate 7000 Malawian nationals stranded in Durban
By Kwanda Mkhonto
A Facebook post claiming that South Africa is seeking more than 1,000 buses to repatriate 7,000 Malawians in Durban is false.
This comes after a wave of protests initiated by a civic organisation, March and March, asking undocumented immigrants to leave the country by 30 June 2026.
The post claims, “The South African government says it urgently needs more than 1,000 buses to assist with the voluntary repatriation of approximately 7,000 Malawian nationals currently gathered in Durban awaiting transport back to Malawi”.
It further claims “the announcement was made by Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi during a briefing by the Inter-Ministerial Committee on Migration.”
The post was published on Facebook at 20:44 on 14 June 2026.
A Google reverse image search shows that the image originated from “The Mzansi Plug” Facebook page, the time the post first appeared. Additional photos are reshares and reposts, all from Facebook, throughout different days.
A scrutiny of the image shows some red flags. Some people in the image have disfigured faces; one person in the image has two heads; there are people with only the lower body and no head. These are all characteristics of an AI-generated image. 
To confirm our suspicions, we pasted the image on Hive Models, an AI-detection tool, which revealed that the image was 99.4 % AI-generated. 
Justice Minister Mmamoloko Kubayi, in an Interministerial Committee meeting on 14 June, said “the Malawian government has commissioned 8 buses […] to expedite the repatriation process. Our government will support the efforts with an additional 10 buses.”
She said more buses were needed as the numbers were going up. “Now with the numbers going up to 7000 you need almost 100 buses to be able to repatriate,” said Kubayi.
The situation has since changed; more Malawian nationals have joined in the Sherwood spot. The Durban mayor, Cyril Xaba, has said in a statement that the South African government has made 20 buses available for repatriation of Malawians, which is more than double the amount they pledged on 14 June.
Verdict: FALSE
This fact-check was produced by Centre for Information Integrity in Africa as part of the African Fact-Checking Alliance’s (AFCA) incubation programme. It was produced with peer-mentorship from Code for Africa’s fact-checking initiative, PesaCheck, with financial support from Norway Democracy. AFCA mentorship respects the journalistic independence of the researchers, offering access to advanced techniques and tools. Editorial decision-making remains with Centre for Information Integrity in Africa. Want to learn more? Visit: https://factcheck.africa/
