'Safe and happy' in the States

The US embassy and state department are mum about how the claims of relocated Afrikaners were verified

- Lyse Comins

Afrikaner small-scale farmer Jan* and his wife Marietjie* were the victims of a farm attack in which their dogs were poisoned and gunmen fired 67 shots into their home.

They survived, unlike fellow Afrikaners Dawid and Rallie de Villiers, in their 80s, who were murdered in their home in Eastern Cape with the perpetrators leaving satanic symbols painted in their blood, according to local media reports.

Or Lindley farmer Attie Potgieter, who was stabbed more than 150 times while his wife and two-year-old daughter were forced to watch before being murdered too.

But not all victims of farm murders are white — scores of black workers have also been caught up in the violence, and black farmers have not been spared, including David Netshilaphala, a 62-year-old small-scale farmer in Limpopo, who disappeared after checking his kraal. Police found his body several weeks later.

Nor are all attackers black people. In August 2022, a Ficksburg farmer, Morgan Barratt, was assaulted by Rudi Gericke and Kleinjan le Grange. In January 2023, Evan Sorour, 28, also a farmer in the Ficksburg area, was shot dead and his father, Reuter, assaulted by Gericke, who was sentenced to 13 years for murder.

Farm murders are in international headlines after 59 Afrikaners landed in the US under President Donald Trump’s programme to give refugee status to those “who are victims of unjust racial discrimination”.

An executive order signed by Trump said the US will promote the resettlement of Afrikaner “refugees” escaping “government-sponsored race-based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation”. It has since been expanded to include all minorities, including coloured and Indian South Africans.

But critics in South Africa and elsewhere have pointed out that farm violence also affects black people, and that violent crime is a national issue that has millions of people living in fear, regardless of race.