[zx76]

Exchange control has been somewhat relaxed compared to when I'm guessing when your parents left. It used be insanely punitive. Provided you have up to date tax clearance I think you can now take R11m out the country per year. So approx. $600k per year. So people with a higher net worth than this who are leaving will have to a take a few years to fully financially emigrate, but it used to be much more complicated and restricted. If you have a substantially larger net worth you can also negotiate with the reserve bank! Famously Mark Shuttleworth - the Ubuntu linux founder - had a series of big court cases litigating some of these rules. He sold Thawte for approx $500m(?) to Verisign while South African but then moved to the UK. It's still a very unusual thing and foreigners are often surprised that a country with western style democracy has some China-style exchange controls.