United States President Donald Trump, left, and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, right, have been at loggerheads due to South Africa’s new land laws, Image: Radio Liberty File
(The Post News)- South Africa’s land expropriation law, Israel’s role in a genocide case before the International Court of Justice (ICJ), and the country’s growing ties with Iran are among the issues mentioned in an executive order signed by U.S. President Donald Trump.
Trump’s executive order explicitly denounces South Africa’s new law that permits the expropriation of agricultural land without compensation, highlighting the U.S. government’s opposition to the country’s recent land policy, which it claims violates the rights of Afrikaners, an ethnic minority of primarily white descendants of early Dutch and French settlers.
Critics claim that the Expropriation Act unfairly singles out the Afrikaner group, which has caused controversy. Concerns have been raised by the US on what it believes to be a breach of property rights and possible racial discrimination in the legislation.
“The United States cannot support the government of South Africa’s commission of rights violations in its country or its undermining United States foreign policy, which poses national security threats to our Nation, our allies, our African partners, and our interests,” the executive order states.
Trump’s order also pledges to support the “resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government sponsored race-based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation.”
In 2023, the United States allocated nearly $440 million in assistance to South Africa, according to the most recent U.S. government data.
Trump has long attacked the law, calling it an unfair way to take land away from some ethnic communities. The billionaire Elon Musk, who was born in South Africa, has expressed similar concerns, calling the country’s land laws “openly racist” and claiming that white people are disproportionately impacted.
The colonial and apartheid past of South Africa is the source of the nation’s land ownership problems. Black South Africans own just 4% of the country’s freehold farmland, although making up 80% of the population. In contrast, a 2017 land audit found that 72% of the nation’s agricultural land is owned by white landowners.
President Cyril Ramaphosa, has recently defended his government’s position, sying that the Expropriation Act is a legally permitted procedure which aims to advance equitable land access rather than a tool for confiscation.
“The recently adopted Expropriation Act is not a confiscation instrument, but a constitutionally mandated legal process that ensures public access to land in an equitable and just manner,” Ramaphosa stated on the social media site X.
The Group of 20 known as the G20 foreign ministers’ conference, which will be held in South Africa later this month, will not be attended by U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio because of the issue. As Trump continues to push for diplomatic efforts in the Ukraine war, Rubio’s absence is viewed as a major setback to the event, which would have given him a chance to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
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