Genocide

There is no genocide in South Africa, which for all its faults has been a constitutional democracy since 1994 when apartheid ended and democracy arrived. For the most part property rights and individual liberties are respected. South Africa has a vibrant free media.  

The genocide narrative is linked to the firebrand Economic Freedom Fighters, the country’s fourth largest political party whose members wear red overalls and red berets emulating Venezuela’s failed former leader Hugo Chavez. At party rallies EFF leader Julius Malema, 44, fires up his base by leading the singing of “shoot the Boers (farmers),” the contentious anthem sung in Zulu or Xhosa during the liberation struggle. Malema is explicitly anti-white but has thus far failed to win widespread support among the African majority. He has not been prosecuted for inciting violence.

In last year’s parliamentary election, the EFF won 39 seats, fewer than in the previous election. In 2024 the ruling African National Congress for the first time lost its majority in the 400-seat national assembly. It has been forced into a government of national unity comprised of very small parties and the main opposition, the pro-free market Democratic Alliance.

Aside from the shoot the Boer/Afrikaner bombast, there have been targeted murders of Afrikaner farmers. However, violence against farmers has declined significantly since 2002 when 119 farmers were killed compared to 32 in 2024. 

South Africa’s commercial farms are often situated in isolated areas several hours drive from towns or police stations. Even though agriculture is mechanized a many hundred-acre farm will have dozens of black workers living on the property. Many white farmers live in fear and are tempted to sell. I recall vividly a decade ago the editor of Farmers Weekly in Johannesburg telling me that his current readers were likely the last generation of Afrikaans farmers.

Refugees?

Are the white South Africans being welcomed to the States by the Trump administration really refugees? This is tricky.  Certainly, they’re not typical refugees. They’re not hungry and not fleeing group persecution. They have been able to practice their religion unimpeded, have been free to vote, basic rights have not been threatened. And most are arriving with money.

That said, the white South Africans probably meet the definition of refugees. The US Citizenship and Immigration Service states the following: “Refugee status or asylum may be granted to people who have been persecuted or fear they will be persecuted on account of race, religion, nationality, and/or membership in a particular social group or political opinion.”

The key phrase is “fear they will be persecuted, etc.”  That fear has resulted in 800,000 mainly white South Africans leaving the country since 1994. The over-riding fear is Malema’s EFF coming to power with a program of ridding South Africa of its white population. The prospect of Malema ever coming to power is dismissed by most political analysts.

The white exodus has some parallel to what happened after the 1976 Soweto uprising touched off riots throughout the country when the apartheid government killed hundreds of youthful protesters demonstrating against the use of Afrikaans as a language of instruction. Some blacks fled to take up arms while white professionals, fearing continuing upheaval, sought safety and opportunity abroad.

Ironically perhaps, for many South Africa itself is a land of opportunity.  Since 1994 more than two million immigrants from a score of African countries have come to South Africa in search of a better life. 

Transformation

By some measures South Africa is the world’s most unequal society.  There are huge gaps between rich and poor and the white minority has little political power but vast economic power. To narrow the gap the government promotes preference for blacks in hiring and access to higher education.

Transformation is a laudable goal but the transfer of skills is a time-consuming process. Affirmative action alienates applicants passed over because of race.  Further, endemic corruption means political cronies often bereft of skills are promoted to positions of authority.  Public services–policing, water and electricity supply, port operations and railways—are often dysfunctional and plagued by incompetence and theft.

Critics point out that the ANC led government has pushed through parliament over 100 race-based laws promoting transformation. One statute, the employment equity amendment act, imposes race quotas for companies with 50 employees or more. 

While Afrikaans continues to be one of the country’s 12 official languages, Afrikaans language universities are encouraged to switch to English as they are serving a rising percentage of students without Afrikaans fluency.  This is seen by some Afrikaners as an attack on their language and culture.

Ramaphosa Meets Trump

Seventy-two-year-old Cyril Ramaphosa, who heads the ANC, was elected president in 2018. His term as South African president expires in 2029. Ramaphosa, a moderate, was an aide to Nelson Mandela in the negotiations that ended apartheid. He gained prominence as president of the mine workers union and later as a well-connected businessman. A lawyer, he has made land reform a priority in his second presidential term.

South Africa this year holds the rotating presidency of the Group of 20 developing and industrial countries most concerned with the world economy. Ramaphosa will host the annual G20 summit in South Africa in November.

Ramaphosa calls the Afrikaner refugees cowards who oppose societal transformation. He has not asked them to reconsider nor said they are welcome to remain in South Africa. 

I believe Ramaphosa has three objectives for his Wednesday meeting with President Trump. He will say Afrikaners are not oppressed and thus not refugees. He will emphasize that the land expropriation act has not been used. He will ask Trump to extend the 25-year-old African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), that allows many African products duty-free access to the US market.  Finally, he will urge the president to attend the G20 summit that Ramaphosa will host in November.  

Economic performance is Ramaphosa’s Achilles Heel. For a decade South Africa has registered anemic growth of one percent or less. Because the African population is rapidly increasing, per capita incomes have been declining. 

Does President Ramaphosa want South Africa to be the rainbow nation championed by Nelson Mandela?  While he is likely to answer yes, his critics domestic and foreign are skeptical. #

Barry D. Wood was a correspondent for the Financial Mail magazine and NBC radio in Johannesburg in the late 70s. Since 2010 he has made multiple visits to the new South Africa including two short-term teaching assignments in the Eastern Cape.