On February 7, Kenyan police arrested 41 undocumented Ethiopian migrants and two human smugglers at a house in Nairobi.

The all-male group, which was reportedly on its way to South Africa, will be prosecuted for breaching Kenya’s immigration laws and likely deported to Ethiopia.

Strange as it might sound, these migrants should consider themselves fortunate to have been arrested because their ordeal in Kenya stopped them – at least for now – from embarking on an uncertain and highly dangerous journey.

Between 2020 and 2022, authorities in Mozambique, Malawi, and Zambia discovered the bodies of more than 100 undocumented migrants from Ethiopia who have died from hunger or suffocation while traveling clandestinely toward South Africa.

According to the International Organization for Migration, irregular migration from the Horn of Africa to Southern Africa is largely “facilitated by an intricate network of smugglers and traffickers” whose “aggressive attempts to avoid detection by authorities put migrants’ lives in danger”.

As detailed by the African Union, people migrate within Africa due to “a multiplicity of factors that include the need for improved socio-economic conditions through employment, environmental factors, as well as respite from political instability, conflict, and civil strife.