US President Donald Trump said he would reduce all future funding in South Africa for allegations that land was confiscated and “treat some classes of people very badly”.
Last month, President Cyril Ramaphosa has signed a bill that authorizes seizures without compensation in certain circumstances.
Land ownership has long been a controversial problem in South Africa with most private agricultural land belonging to whites, 30 years after the end of the racist apartheid system.
There have been continuous calls for government to combat agrarian reform and manage past injustices of racial segregation.
President of South Africa replied to Trump with a post on X: “South Africa is a constitutional democracy deeply rooted in the rule of law, justice and equality. The South African government has confiscated any land.”
He added that the only financing of South Africa received from the United States was of the Pepfar health initiative, which represented “17% of the HIV / AIDS program in South Africa”.
The United States has allocated around $ 440 million (358 million pounds Sterling) in South Africa in 2023, according to US government data.
Elon Musk, who was born and grew up in South Africa and is now a Trump advisor, also joined the debate, saying that the new law has discriminated against the whites.
“Why do you have openly racist property laws?” Mr. Musk said to Ramaphosa in a post on X.
On Sunday, Trump wrote on his social media platform Truth Social: “I will cut all future funding in South Africa until a complete survey on this situation is completed!”
He later declared, in a briefing with journalists, that “the leadership of South Africa has terrible things, horrible things”.
“So, it is under investigation at the moment. We will take a determination, and until we discover what South Africa does – they removed land and confiscated land, and in fact, they make things that may be far worse than that. “
The new law of South Africa authorizes expropriation without compensation only in the circumstances where it is “fair and fair and in the public interest” to do so.
This includes if the property is not used and there is no intention to develop or make money, or when it presents a risk for people.
South Africa has a long and turbulent history with land ownership dating from colonial domination. In 1913, legislation was introduced which restricted property rights from the country’s black majority.
The law on indigenous lands has left the vast majority of land to control the white minority and established the basics of forced elimination of blacks to the fatherland and poor cantons in the intermediate decades until the end of apartheid there has three decades.
In 1994, the head of the African National Congress (ANC) Nelson Mandela became the first democratically elected president of the country after all the South Africans had the right to vote.
So far, the government has been able to buy land only from its current owners under the principle of the “voluntary seller, voluntary buyer”, who, according to some, has delayed the process of agrarian reform.
In 2017, a government report Said that on the agricultural land that was in the hands of individuals, 72% were belonging to whites. According to the 2022 census Whites represent 7.3% of the population.
However, some criticisms have expressed their fears that the new land on land may have disastrous consequences such as Zimbabwe, where convulsions have saved the economy and frightened investors.
South African Minister for Mineral Resources, Gwede Mantashe, responded to Trump’s comments saying to a mining conference that the country should refuse its minerals if “they” [US] Do not give us money “.
South Africa exports a variety of minerals to the United States, including platinum, iron and manganese.
Afriforum, a group focused on the protection of rights and interests of the Afrikaner White population of South Africa, hopes that the government will change the new law to “ensure the protection of property rights”.
However, he said that this did not agree with Trump’s threat to reduce funding, which suggests that punitive measures should be addressed to “senior old managers” and not to South Africans .
The ANC, led by Ramaphosa, is currently governing South Africa as a coalition government with nine smallest parties.
Trump also struck in South Africa during his first mandate as American presidentAsking the American Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, to study the “agricultural crises and expropriations of the country and the large -scale murder of farmers”.
At that time, South Africa accused Trump of trying to sow the division, with a spokesperson saying that he was “poorly informed”.