In South Africa, Trump’s false claims spark a renewed racial reckoning

CAPE TOWN, South Africa – False claims made by U.S. President Donald Trump in the Oval Office on Wednesday that South Africa’s Black majority is trying to wipe out white Afrikaners have roiled this country – forcing race to the forefront of a national conversation in a way rarely seen since the end of apartheid.

The “born frees,” young people who came of age after the country’s first free elections in 1994 and were promised a bright future in a new South Africa, described uncomfortable conversations with friends and colleagues – navigating racial tensions largely unfamiliar to their generation. White South Africans – Afrikaners or not – gave voice to long-suppressed anger about the perceived failure of the African National Congress to deliver on its promises of an equal, nonracial society.

South Africa, heralded three decades ago by Nobel Peace Prize winners Nelson Mandela and Archbishop Demond Tutu as the rainbow nation, is the most unequal society in the world, according to the World Bank. It is marred by massive economic disparities and unequal access to jobs and education. Many neighborhoods are still segregated by race. Violent crime remains a scourge.

A day after the meeting at the White House between Trump and South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, Trump’s explosive and unfounded claims of “genocide” against white farmers dominated headlines, social media and chatter across the country.

Some outlets applauded Ramaphosa for remaining calm as Trump went on the offensive: “He didn’t get Zelenskyed,” wrote the Daily Maverick, referring to Trump’s contentious encounter with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in February.

“Trump has forced SA to confront our crime scourge,” read an editorial from News24, the country’s biggest online publication.

“This genocide debate is awkward, man, I don’t know,” said Relebogile Thekiso, 27, a Black graphic design intern in Johannesburg. “Today at work, everyone was talking about it, even making jokes. But some white colleagues didn’t participate.

“It got me wondering if they are quiet because they agree with Trump. This week, I will maintain a social distance from my (white) friend until the situation blows over.”

Ramaphosa hoped his visit to Washington would reset relations at a time when South Africa has cut spending and is weighed down by debt. Finance Minister Enoch Godongwana said on Wednesday the economy was expected to grow at a rate of 1.4% this year, down half a point from projections in March.

A trade deal with the United States would help. But it wasn’t Trump’s main priority on Wednesday, as he steered the conversation to the plight of white Afrikaners.

“Thousands” were applying for refugee status in the United States, the president said, a claim that has been difficult to verify.

A first group of about 50 white South Africans arrived in the United States earlier this month under a humanitarian designation the administration has suspended for other groups fleeing war and persecution.

Trump’s focus on the murder of white farmers has dredged up long-buried tensions over race, an issue that has haunted South Africa since its earliest days of colonial subjugation. In the run-up to the 1994 election, which ultimately marked the end of white minority rule, fears of a full-on race war were widespread in some communities.

“Farm murders in South Africa are a brutality of a special kind,” said John Endres, chief executive of the South African Institute of Race Relations, or IRR.

“These crimes are characterized by senseless violence, directed at vulnerable people like elderly farmers and their families.”

But, he said, “it is inaccurate to identify white farmers as the only victims of these crimes.”

In 2023, according to IRR data, there were 49 people killed on farms, some of them Black.

Nationwide, there were 27,621 murders that year; about 80% of the victims were “poor, under- or unemployed young Black males,” Endres said.

Ernst van Zyl, head of public relations for AfriForum, a rights group for Afrikaners, said many had become disillusioned with party politics in South Africa but denied that large numbers wanted to leave the country.

“It’s not to the point where they’ve stopped voting, but it’s not their only avenue to bring about change,” van Zyl said, saying Afrikaner activists were increasingly involved with civil society organizations tackling problems on the local level.

“People feel more comfortable talking about the issue of farm murders now that the president of the United States is talking about it,” van Zyl added. “People on the outside looking in are seeing something incredibly disturbing and unacceptable.”

In a population of more than 60 million people, about 4.6 million are white, South Africa’s latest census found in 2022. About 2.7 million spoke Afrikaans as their first language.

Tshepo Madlingozi, an official at the South African Human Rights Commission, said the country remains fractured along racial lines and has yet to fully confront its painful history. “This really shows we have a long way to go in building a nation,” said Madlingozi.

South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established 30 years ago to unearth apartheid-era atrocities, was widely praised. But critics said it prioritized national reconciliation at the expense of justice for victims.

“We were not honest with one another about what happened and who did what to whom, and how do we fix it,” Madlingozi said. “That was a big mistake.”

He said Trump’s false claims about genocide were “very painful and a bit of a betrayal” to Black South Africans, many of whom are still dealing with deep-rooted institutional racism. “I am talking about universities and schools that still uphold whiteness, where whiteness is still the norm, where white privilege is still supported,” Madlingozi said.

Thekiso, the graphic designer, said she and her co-workers used to laugh together about “social media videos of White people dancing or speaking vernacular.” She and her white friend would get lunch together from street vendors near taxi stands mainly used by Black commuters.

“She is not that kind of (racist) person; she is cool,” said Thekiso. “I’ll probably ask her if she wants to leave South Africa or what her thoughts are about what Trump said at some point.” But she doesn’t feel ready for that conversation quite yet.

Palesa Nxumalo, 21, was studying for exams during the Trump-Ramaphosa meeting on Wednesday but saw videos of their exchanges on TikTok. “Do white people, when they look at me, think I am going to kill them?,” she wondered. “I will be cautious around them. I don’t want any drama around me.”

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Timse reported from Johannesburg.