A nation at odds with itself

AGOA AND AFRIKANER ‘REFUGEES’

- TARA ROOS

AS a chartered plane carrying 49 Afrikaner “refugees” touches down in Washington, DC, under the invitation of former President Donald Trump, South Africa’s President Cyril Ramaphosa prepares for a far more consequential landing of his own.

He will arrive in the US this week to lobby for the renewal of the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a preferential trade agreement that grants South African exporters duty-free access to American markets. That this diplomatic visit follows so closely on the heels of a flight cloaked in white grievance and manufactured genocide narratives is no coincidence it is a symptom of the same unresolved contradictions at the heart of South Africa’s post-apartheid identity: a nation that cannot decide whose suffering it takes seriously.

Trump's invitation to self-styled Afrikaner victims, most of whom claim “discrimination” and “white genocide,” is a damning reflection of how global far-right movements have opportunistically latched onto South Africa's unresolved racial wounds.