Visa glitch lands SAfrica soccer coach yellow card

JOHANNESBURG, Feb 12 (Reuters) Annointed the would-be saviour of South Africa's hapless national soccer team, Brazilian coach Carlos Parreira has learned he is a mere mortal in the eyes of the nation's immigration department.

Parreira, who arrived in South Africa last month to begin preparing the national squad for the 2010 World Cup, which South Africa is hosting, was told to stop working late last week because he didn't have a valid permit from the government.

His assistant Jairo Lopes Cesar Leal also had to hang up his spikes for the same reason.

The pair had entered South Africa on visitor visas and, consequently, were not allowed to take up employment until they had applied to change their status, the Department of Home Affairs announced in a tersely worded statement on Friday.

It noted that anyone who violated its amended 2004 immigration act could be fined, jailed or deported.

The department has been widely accused of not processing work permit applications or other basic documents in a timely manner, locking out people with needed skills and undermining the government's drive to boost growth.

Some applicants have had to wait half a year or longer.

While South African soccer fans contemplated waiving goodbye to Parreira just weeks after he had arrived, Home Affairs and the South African Football Association (SAFA), which employs the coach and assistant, worked to resolve the case.

Today, the government granted a work permit to Parreira, said Cleo Mosana, a spokeswoman for the minister of home affairs. Leal's application, however, was still being processed, Mosana added.

She noted that SAFA had submitted incomplete work permit applications on behalf of the men last week. ''SAFA could have done this administratively better,'' she said. SAFA officials were not immediately available for comment.

The controversy was the latest cloud over South Africa's World Cup.

Sky-high levels of violent crime and delays in moving ahead with stadium construction and other preparations have raised fears the African nation will be unable to successfully host the 2010 tournament.

Reuters KR DB2304