A high-level meeting intended to thaw frosty relations
between the United States and South Africa took an unexpected turn when
President Donald Trump ambushed Cyril Ramaphosa, his South African counterpart,
with a video supporting claims of a “white genocide” in the black-majority
nation.
In a theatrical move, Trump ordered the lights dimmed as the
video was on standby mode and played on screens in the Oval Office during
Wednesday’s bilateral meeting.
The nearly five-minute video, later shared on the White
House’s X account, was captioned, “Proof of Persecution in South Africa”.
Ramaphosa appeared visibly unsettled, his expression
revealing confusion and discomfort, yet he maintained his composure throughout
the encounter.
Claims of white genocide in South Africa, mostly made by the
Trump administration, including South Africa-born Elon Musk, have been
repeatedly debunked.
South Africa has also strongly rejected the claims.
At one point while the video was playing, Ramaphosa asked,
“Have they told you where that is?”
Trump shook his head in the negative, and Ramaphosa went
ahead to challenge the US president’s stance.
“If there was Afrikaner farmer genocide, I can bet you these
three gentlemen would not be here, including my minister of agriculture; he would
not be with me,” Ramaphosa said, referring to White members of his delegation.
Those on his entourage included John Steenhuisen,
agriculture minister, and Retief Goosen and Ernie Els, prominent golfers.
“There is criminality in our country,” Ramaphosa added.
“People who do get killed, unfortunately through criminal
activity, are not only White people; the majority of them are Black people.”
Both leaders also spoke about the disputed land policy in
South Africa.
Ramaphosa defended the policy, noting that it was initiated
to redistribute land due to inequalities in the country from the decades-long
apartheid regime that ruled South Africa until 1994.
But Trump interjected, saying White South Africans were
executed because of the law.
The policy was the bone of contention between both
countries, leading to the US halting funding to South Africa.
Wednesday’s meeting marked Ramaphosa’s long-anticipated
effort to mend strained ties with his US counterpart.
However, the South African president was unprepared for the
meeting to mirror the tense atmosphere of a previous Oval Office encounter
between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, held months earlier.
That meeting had ended in a heated exchange, culminating in
Zelensky being escorted out.
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