Anti-immigration protests erupt across South Africa as thousands line the streets demanding deportations

Anti-immigration protests erupted across South Africa as thousands lined the streets demanding deportations of all illegal arrivals.

Security forces were deployed to monitor massive crowds of demonstrators marching through some of the nation's largest cities yesterday.

Campaign groups imposed a deadline of June 30 for illegal migrants workers to leave South Africa after blaming them for a series of issues facing the nation, from overstretched services to rising crime.

In a keen bid to maintain momentum, leaders promised the marches would take place every week until the end of the year.

Protest group, March and March, is based in the KwaZulu-Natal province and led the renewed marches against the rise of immigration.

Jacinta Ngobese-Zuma, the organisation's leader, dismissed claims the group's mission was xenophobic.

At the event, Ms Ngobese-Zuma told supporters: "As March on March, we are not tired. From now on in the country, for as long as they are all not gone, every Thursday we march."

Migrants claimed that armed youths have been doorstepping foreigners, telling them to leave.

Others were thrown out of their homes by landlords worried that the mere presence of migrants in the property could spur on vicious mobs.

The Ministry of Police confirmed that, on the whole, the recent protests were peaceful and that troops were sent out on a "contingency basis" across Johannesburg and Durban.

Three were arrested in Hillbrow, Johannesburg, after a group "opened fire at protesters passing through the street".

Other furious protesting participants hurled bricks and broke windows of properties in Yeoville, which has a high African population.

A little further out of the city, in Germiston, protesters marched on homes, dragged residents suspected to be foreign nationals out of the property and demanding they get searched and assessed by police, South African press reported.

Around 10 people were arrested for alleged looting in the KwaZulu-Natal province, while another five were arrested for the same in Soweto, Johannesburg.

South African politicians have condemned the violence depicted on the streets, but admitted that illegal migration has gotten out of hand.

Lawmakers are seeking to tighten border control to combat the surge in migration to the country.

One leader, Ngizwe Mchunu, said: "It's a very sad story that we have been telling our Government since the dawn of democracy that illegal immigration here is out of hand.

"It is time for our Government to put South Africa first."

Mr Mchunu also blamed migrants for the rise in illegal drugs in the country and accused them of taking over neighbourhood shops which should be owned by South Africans.

Thousands of migrants from Malawi and Zimbabwe have pleaded with consulates in a desperate bid to acquire sanctuary, or be put on repatriation buses.

Meanwhile, Nigeria and Ghana's Governments hit out at Pretoria, the executive capital of South Africa, for failing to protect their citizens.