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Shadowing practice: Malawi, Mozambique evacuate citizens after attacks | DW News

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  1. Malawi has become the latest country to announce it will repatriate its citizens from South Africa.0:00
  2. The announcement follows anti -immigration protests in South Africa that turned violent last weekend.0:06
  3. The victims, mostly from Malawi and Mozambique, reported mobs of South African locals burning houses and attacking foreigners in the coastal town of Mosul Bay.0:12
  4. Mozambique has already begun bringing its citizens home.0:23
  5. Long after midnight, dozens of Mozambicans arrive at the border with South Africa.0:28
  6. They're heading home, but not by choice.0:34
  7. Mozambique has now repatriated hundreds of citizens from South Africa after a spike in attacks against foreign workers.0:38
  8. Weeks of small protests against foreign nationals exploded into violence over the weekend in the South African town of Mosul Bay.0:46
  9. Adelman Mambo was there.0:53
  10. I don't know how to put it, but the locals turned against us.0:56
  11. They say they no longer have work because of us, and they're beating us up, burning our houses, our clothes, everything.1:00
  12. I ran for my life until I was taken in at the local stadium.1:08
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  1. Mozambique says seven of its citizens were killed after the protests turned violent.1:13
  2. South African police confirmed two deaths.1:18
  3. Victims described mobs of locals going door to door, telling them to leave the country.1:21
  4. They didn't care.1:28
  5. All they wanted to know was that you weren't South African.1:29
  6. They didn't want your name or your documents.1:32
  7. All they needed to know was that you weren't from here.1:35
  8. Mozambique is not alone in bringing its citizens home.1:41
  9. Malawi and Nigeria have announced they will also begin repatriation flights.1:44
  10. Ghana has already flown hundreds back.1:49
  11. Behind the anti -immigration protests are a loose coalition of South African political parties and anti -immigrant vigilante groups.1:52
  12. The South African government has largely rejected accusations of xenophobia, instead urging other African nations to address the economic crisis, driving migration.2:00
  13. Many of those forced to flee South Africa originally left home to find more work and better living conditions.2:10
  14. Now they are returning with little more than what they can carry.2:18
  15. Our correspondent, Diane Hawker, is following the story.2:23
  16. Diane, what more can you tell us about the violence in Mosul Bay?2:27
  17. How did these protests escalate?2:30
  18. Why did they turn so deadly?2:32
  19. Well, the protests took place mainly on Friday evening and they continued a little bit into the weekend.2:37
  20. And it seems like there were members of the community who had agitated for the protest, formed a small group and then started marching through the area.2:44
  21. There are reports that after that march they then started knocking on doors and trying to kind of find out if there were any immigrants who stayed in that area.2:55
  22. Police also said that there were 55 shacks, homes in that area that were also set alight in the violence.3:07
  23. And it took a bit of time for them to get the situation to calm down.3:14
  24. As of today, the situation has calmed down.3:18
  25. Police say that there are five people who are arrested for public violence, but they are still investigating and they haven't yet arrested anyone related to the deaths or the3:21
  26. killings of any Mozambican nationals as of now.3:33
  27. President Cyril Ramaphosa has vowed to crack down on illegal migration.3:38
  28. Speaking to parliament, he also called on citizens to refrain from violence without directly mentioning the attacks.3:43
  29. Let's listen to what he had to say.3:49
  30. Every person in South Africa, whether they are citizens or foreign nationals, must respect our laws.3:52
  31. They must also respect the rise of every person in our country and our laws must be upheld.4:01
  32. We must never give in to violence, to xenophobia and to vigilantism.4:11
  33. So Diane, how is President Ramaphosa's message being received there?4:24
  34. Well I would say that President Cyril Ramaphosa is currently trying to navigate a very difficult period where there are people who are strongly advocating for the government to take4:31
  35. serious action and they view the government as having not done enough to deal with illegal immigration.4:47
  36. Many people on that side of the fence are not particularly pleased with these comments saying that he's just repeating what the government has previously said and not really coming4:53
  37. with more of an idea of what action will be taken.5:03
  38. On the flip side, he is trying to navigate dealing with human rights and also with the rule of law and we've seen there is a concern that has been5:07
  39. raised by some civil society groups that the government hasn't been stern enough as well as African leaders have also complained that the government hasn't taken a strong enough stance.5:18
  40. And in that speech yesterday he really was trying to hit notes on both sides and I would say that the response hasn't been loud applause from either side because5:27
  41. I think the message is trying to do a lot and not everyone is really happy with what he's saying.5:38
  42. I understand that police briefed the press there today.5:45
  43. What do they say about their response to the violence, Diane?5:49
  44. Are they facing criticism for how they handled it?5:53
  45. Well, the police, today we saw the National Police Leadership head to Muscle Bay which is actually quite a small coastal town.5:59
  46. So not a usual event to see National Police leadership descending on the small coastal town.6:08
  47. The police have really been trying to say what they will be doing going forward to prevent further action like this.6:15
  48. They mentioned for example putting public order police in hotspots that they will identify areas across the country which they see as places where violence could flare up.6:24
  49. They've also tried to reiterate that they are doing something about the illegal immigration concerns.6:36
  50. They gave some statistics for example saying that since January of 2026 they've arrested more than 34 ,000 people in relation to immigration violations and also mentioned that in the6:43
  51. previous financial year they arrested more than 76 ,000 people in relation to illegal immigration.6:56
  52. So the police really trying to show that they are doing quite a lot but also sending a message to those involved in these protests saying that they won't tolerate7:02
  53. any lawlessness and saying that they are currently in the process of investigating and looking for agitators who might have incited any kind of violent action.7:12
  54. Saying that the rule of law needs to persist and while people have the right to protest that that right should also be balanced with the rights to life and7:24
  55. the rights to safety of other people within the borders of the country.7:35
  56. Now for viewers who may not have followed this story closely, what has triggered this atmosphere in South Africa?7:40
  57. What's driving these anti -immigrant protests?7:47
  58. Well there's a complex political and economic environment that sort of underlies the current situation that we're dealing with.7:53
  59. South Africa is one of the countries where we see a lot of in -migration especially from our neighbouring countries within the Satic region.8:03
  60. Statistics South Africa points out that for 85 % of immigrants coming to South Africa originate from the other Satic countries, countries like Zimbabwe, Mozambique, Lesotho, Botswana, Namibia.8:12
  61. So those all around us, many of them are looking for economic opportunities in South Africa and that has created quite a lot of tension in communities.8:26
  62. For example, a lot of restaurants in South Africa have been hiring members of the immigrant community and paying their matter lesser rate.8:38
  63. That has created tension.8:47
  64. There's also tension being created by the high levels of unemployment in South Africa and the fact that there's an economic crisis as we speak.8:49
  65. And these things have kind of churned up into this call that illegal immigrants should leave the country.8:58
  66. Diane, thank you very much.9:05
  67. That was our correspondent, Diane Hawker there in Johannesburg.9:06

English listening practice with a B2 report on the Mosul Bay attacks

This DW News segment gives you english listening practice built on real broadcast delivery: a correspondent's script cut with on the ground interviews from Mozambican citizens fleeing South Africa. The clip runs at 159 words per minute, sits at B2, and moves across 79 lines, so you get enough runway to work a full report rather than one isolated sentence. The mixed accent, a narrator voice set against South African and Mozambican English, is exactly the range you meet in real broadcast audio, not a single clean voice reading slowly for learners.

The subject matter is not staged for learners either. It is a working correspondent script: short declarative sentences stacked with facts, the way real news delivery moves, and not the paced simplification you get in graded material. Sitting with a report like this trains you to keep pace with information density, not only individual words, which is the harder half of understanding spoken English.

How to improve your english accent with the Mosul Bay victim interviews

Three lines from the interview segment carry the register shift that makes this clip worth repeating out loud.

  • "I don't know how to put it, but the locals turned against us." The hesitation at the start, before the speaker settles on a phrase, is how real unscripted English actually opens a sentence, not how a textbook dialogue opens one.
  • "They didn't want your name or your documents." The stress falls on your, a contrastive emphasis that a flat reading misses, and it is the whole point of the sentence.
  • "All they needed to know was that you weren't from here." The contracted weren't and the falling pitch at the end give the line its finality; read it flat and that finality disappears.

A shadowing english speaking practice b2 route through the Mosul Bay report

Work this clip as an english speaking practice session in order, not at random. The register changes across the report, and each shift needs its own pass rather than one continuous read.

  • Start with line 1, "Malawi has become the latest country to announce it will repatriate its citizens from South Africa." It sets the topic sentence pace typical of a news opener; shadow this line until the stress on repatriate and citizens lands where the narrator puts it.
  • Move to lines 7 and 8, the recap sentences. Both pack a full event into one dense clause; repeat them until you can say the whole sentence without a breath in the middle, the way the narrator does.
  • Slow down for lines 10 to 19, the interview block. The accent shifts from narrator to witness and the pace drops here; shadow it separately from the news lines around it rather than folding it into the same pass.
  • Finish with lines 27 to 32, where the anchor hands off to a correspondent. Match the question and answer rhythm in this stretch, since it is the closest this clip gets to a real conversation.
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