For much of the continent, South Africa is the pot of gold at its end, and each new war or famine triggers a wave of new arrivals desperate towork on farms or building sites for a pittance, or even for a daily bowl of porridge. Many end up at the lowest rungs of the economy and live clustered together, creating their own neighborhoods. The biggest influx comes from Mozambique, which has been ravaged by nearly 20 years of civil war. South of the park, about 40 miles of electric fence still stands. The voltage is now set to give only a strong shock.
Soldiers monitor computers that sound alarms whenever it is breached, and they take up the chase.
Many immigrants slip through by running into the sugar-cane fields, emerging on roads where they catch minivan taxis to carry them away quickly. Last year the Army Group 33, which patrols near Komatipoort, arrested about 22,000 border-jumpers. It keeps them overnight in a large holding cell on its base, gives them breakfast and takes them back to Mozambique. But officials say most simply try again the next day, which makes it difficult to keep up the soldiers' morale. Gustav Brink, who is in charge of one of the units that patrol the fence.