US President Donald Trump seemed to ambush his South African counterpart at the White House on Wednesday, confronting him with a video that Trump said supported his claim that white farmers were being “persecuted” in the country.
The footage, shown during a news conference with Cyril Ramaphosa, purported to show the gravesites of murdered farmers. Trump did not say where it was filmed, and the footage has not been verified by the BBC.
Ramaphosa – who appeared to weigh up carefully how to respond – disputed Trump’s allegation. He said black people were far more likely to be victims of violence in South Africa than white people.
Trump also said that he would seek an “explanation” from his guest on widely discredited claims of a white “genocide” in South Africa.
Ramaphosa came to the White House on Wednesday for trade talks to reset US-South African relations.
He had hoped to charm Trump with the inclusion of two of South Africa’s best-known golfers in the delegation. Ramaphosa also came equipped with a gift of a huge book featuring his country’s golf courses.
But after a cordial start, the mood in the Oval Office shifted as Trump asked for the lighting to be lowered so a video could be played.
The film featured the voice of leading South African opposition figure Julius Malema singing the song: “Shoot the Boer [Afrikaner], Shoot the farmer”.
It also showed a field of crosses, which the US president, talking over the images, said was a burial site of white farmers.
He then handed Ramaphosa what appeared to be print-outs of stories of white people being attacked in South Africa.
“What you saw – the speeches that were made… that is not government policy,” Ramaphosa responded.
“We have a multiparty democracy in South Africa that allows people to express themselves.
“Our government policy is completely against what he [Malema] was saying even in the parliament, and they are a small minority party, which is allowed to exist according to our constitution.”
Ramaphosa said he hoped that Trump would listen to the voices of South Africans on this issue.
The South African leader pointed out the white members of his delegation, including golfers Ernie Els and Retief Goosen, and South Africa’s richest man, Johann Rupert.
“If there was a genocide, these three gentlemen would not be here,” Ramaphosa said.
Trump interrupted: “But you do allow them to take land, and then when they take the land, they kill the white farmer, and when they kill the white farmer nothing happens to them.”
“No,” Ramaphosa responded.
Trump appeared to be referring to a controversial law signed by Ramaphosa earlier this year, which allows the government to seize privately-owned land without compensation in some circumstances. The South African government says no land has yet been seized under the act.
Speaking to Trump on Wednesday, Ramaphosa did acknowledge that there was “criminality in our country… people who do get killed through criminal activity are not only white people, the majority of them are black people”.
As Trump pressed the issue, Ramaphosa stayed calm and tried to work his charm by making a joke about offering a plane to the US.
He invoked the name of anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela, saying South Africa remained committed to racial reconciliation.
When a journalist asked what would happen if white farmers left South Africa, Ramaphosa deflected the question to his white agriculture minister, John Steenhuisen, who said that most farmers wanted to stay.
But Trump kept firing salvoes at Ramaphosa, who avoided entering into a shouting match with him – something that happened to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky when he met Trump in the same room in February.
Earlier this month, a group of 59 white South Africans arrived in the US, where they were granted refugee status. Ramaphosa said at the time they were “cowards”.
Before Wednesday’s White House meeting, South Africa’s leader had stressed that improving trade relations with the US was his priority.
South African exports into the US face a 30% tariff once a pause on Trump’s new import taxes ends in July.
Tensions between South Africa and the US ramped up days after Trump took office for his second term in January.
It was at that point that Ramaphosa signed into law the controversial bill that allows South Africa’s government to expropriate privately-owned land in cases when it is deemed “equitable and in the public interest”.
The move only served to tarnish the image of Africa’s biggest economy in the eyes of the Trump administration, already angered by its genocide case against Israel at the International Court of Justice.
In February, the US president announced the suspension of critical aid to South Africa and offered to allow members of the Afrikaner community, who are mostly white descendants of early Dutch and French settlers, to settle in the US as refugees.
South Africa’s ambassador to Washington, Ebrahim Rasool, was also expelled in March after accusing Trump of “mobilising a supremacism” and trying to “project white victimhood as a dog whistle”.
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