Mr Hazenile puts his foot in

South Africa is scrambling after Trump’s aid ultimatum – and mines minister Gwede Mantashe just made it worse.
3 mins read

US President Donald Trump’s sudden threat to cut aid to South Africa on Sunday evening has left the government flailing, vacillating between accommodation and explanation. But leave it to minister of mineral and petroleum resources Gwede Mantashe to go on the attack. 

Speaking at the Cape Town mining conference, which opened on Monday, Mantashe called on Africa to withhold critical minerals if the US cuts its aid. 

Trump’s sudden intervention into South African affairs was the talk of the mining conference, after he posted on social media platform Truth Social that South Africa was confiscating land and treating “certain classes of people VERY BADLY”, which he said was a “massive Human Rights VIOLATION”. 

“We will act. Also, I will be cutting off all future funding to South Africa until a full investigation of this situation has been completed”, he wrote. Though it wasn’t clarified, Trump was presumably referring to the recently passed Expropriation Act, which technically allows the government to appropriate land without compensation in extreme circumstances.  

President Cyril Ramaphosa tried to pour oil on troubled water by issuing a press statement in which he said that the recently adopted Expropriation Act was not a “confiscation instrument” but a constitutionally mandated legal process “that ensures public access to land in an equitable and just manner as guided by the constitution”. Ramaphosa said he was looking forward to meeting Trump to discuss the issue. 

Unfortunately for Ramaphosa’s reconciliation efforts, Mantashe was at the same time speaking off the cuff at the mining conference, where he presented a different perspective entirely.  

“They want to withhold funding, but they still want our minerals,” he said. “Let’s withhold minerals. Africa needs to assert its advantage and take charge of the growing demand.” 

Africa should not be cowed, Mantashe said. 

“If as a continent we are paralysed with fear, we are going to collapse, but with minerals at our doorstep.”  

Africa is the world’s richest mining jurisdiction, with at least 90% of the world’s chromium and platinum, 40% of the world’s gold, and the largest reserves of cobalt, vanadium, manganese and uranium. 

Without any sense of apparent irony, Mantashe went on to say that, “despite having these abundant mineral resources, Africa remains poor, and this must change”. 

The ANC then complicated the picture by blaming AfriForum for making false claims of “land confiscation”, describing Trump’s tweet as the “direct result of the lobby group’s ongoing efforts to mislead the global community and protect apartheid-era land ownership patterns”.  

“AfriForum has long positioned itself as a defender of white minority privilege, using fearmongering to undermine South Africa’s constitutional and lawful land reform programme,” the ANC said in its response. 

AfriForum, which styles itself as a civil rights organisation, did announce it intended to fight the Expropriation Act after Ramaphosa signed it into law – as did the ANC’s partner in the government of national unity, the DA. 

AfriForum CEO Kallie Kriel said AfriForum would make an urgent request to the South African government to table an amendment to the Expropriation Act that will ensure the protection of property rights in South Africa. 

Agoa gone? 

There is plenty at stake. The extent of US aid to SA has been extremely generous over the years, and estimates suggest it has varied between $200m and $500m a year, mainly focused on the US President’s Emergency Plan for Aids Relief (Pepfar) introduced by former US president George W Bush in 2003. 

Pepfar aid constitutes about 17% of South Africa’s HIV/Aids programme, and there is no other significant funding provided by the US.  But Trump’s action also puts the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa), enacted in 2000 – and up for review this year – into question.  

Agoa grants eligible Sub-Saharan African countries, including South Africa, duty-free access to the US market for more than 6,800 products. This preferential access has facilitated a fivefold increase in South Africa’s agricultural exports to the US, which have grown at about 16% a year since it was initiated. In 2022, these exports reached a record $646m.  

Agoa has also increased South Africa’s automotive exports to the US, which in 2023 were worth about $62m but were at one point almost $2bn in value. 

This coverage of the Mining Indaba was brought to you in association with Northam Platinum.

Top image: Mineral and petroleum resources minister Gwede Mantashe delivers the keynote address at the Cape Town Mining Indaba. Picture: Gallo Images/Brenton Geach.

ALSO READ: Trump shows Ramaphosa the bird

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Tim Cohen

Tim Cohen is a long-time business journalist, commentator and columnist. He is currently senior editor for Currency and editor at large for the Daily Maverick. He was previously the editor of Business Day and the Financial Mail.

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