Zimbabwean refugees should be repatriated, seven out of 10 adults in South Africa's metropolitan areas believe.

According to findings by TNS Research Surveys released on Tuesday, a third of respondents want those in the country legally to leave.

Only 29 percent feel that refugees should be allowed to stay, according to the marketing and social insights company.

"This illustrates the extreme sensitivity that people have towards other Africans living here in the country," it said.

The controversial Zimbabwe elections which were widely dismissed by the rest of the world, have the potential to result in the flooding of more Zimbabwean refugees, unless the three rivals in Zimbabwe reach an agreement.

Competition for services, jobs, houses and other social factors were amongst those that led to the xenophobic violence in May.

The study showed that sensitivity was already there even before the attacks.

According to a second survey, four out of 10 people felt government leadership in dealing with the violence towards immigrants had been good — and almost five out of ten disagreed.

There has been widespread criticism from many quarters of President Thabo Mbeki's policy of "quiet diplomacy" towards Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe.

The right move?

According to the survey, this policy led to the economic meltdown in Zimbabwe, with its inflation now racing at 2.3-million percent.

Some 50 percent of people believed government's policy of quiet diplomacy was the right move.

"On a more positive note, 14 percent of adults said that they had contributed money, clothing, food or other items to help immigrants affected by the violence," the survey said.

Some 26 percent of whites had made contributions.

Only 10 percent of those earning below R1 200 per month said that they had made a contribution.

In terms of religion, followers of Islam had the highest incidence of contributing, followed by other religions.

The studies were conducted amongst a sample of 2000 adults (1260 blacks, 385 whites, 240 coloureds and 115 Indians/Asians) in the seven major metropolitan areas, with a margin of error of under 2.5 percent.

Sapa