SA/US relations: How South Africa now finds itself in humiliating position
President Cyril Ramaphosa arrives at the Joint Base Andrews Airport in Washington. He is received by Trade and Industry and Competition Minister Parks Tau, South African Embassy Chargè d 'Affairs, Stanley Makgohlo, Col Pumla Dlali, Assistant Defence Attache at the South African Embassy and Abby Jones, Acting Chief of Protocol, State Department.
AS A chartered plane carrying 49 Afrikaner 'refugees' touched down in Washington, D.C., under the invitation of former President Donald Trump, South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa made a far more consequential landing of his own.
He arrived in the United States 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.
While these individuals find safe haven in the United States, the Women on Farms Project reminds us that the actual marginalised black and brown farm workers, largely women continue to suffer silently, unheard by the same government now pleading with the U.S. to keep its markets open.
'They are opportunists,' said the Project's Denile Samuel, speaking plainly about the white Afrikaners who fled under Trump's programme. 'The real people who are marginalised, the real people who are not heard and not seen are farm workers.'
Her words land with quiet force. They highlight a bitter irony: that even as white South Africans reinvent themselves as persecuted minorities abroad, the working class remains ignored by ministers who can't be bothered to acknowledge invitations, let alone engage with communities facing daily violations of their labour rights.
It is against this backdrop of performative victimhood and governmental neglect that Ramaphosa's U.S. visit must be understood. The official reason is trade or more accurately, the attempt to save it.
AGOA is set to expire later this year, but its renewal is far from guaranteed. American patience with South Africa has worn thin. Pretoria's geopolitical non-alignment particularly its warm ties with Russia and China has unsettled Washington.
The Lady R scandal, in which a sanctioned Russian cargo ship docked in Simon's Town under suspicious conditions, continues to cast a long shadow. Although President Ramaphosa's Phala Phala cover-up has largely consumed domestic attention, it is the shadow diplomacy of the failure to assure the U.S. of South Africa's reliability that now threatens billions in export revenue and thousands of local jobs.
To be clear, this is not just about citrus fruit and car parts. AGOA is a litmus test for South Africa's global legitimacy. If it fails to secure renewal, it will be a signal that Washington no longer views Pretoria as a trusted partner, but rather as a country adrift neither reliable ally nor coherent adversary. The optics matter. The President is not going to Washington in triumph. He is going cap in hand, attempting to make nice with a partner that no longer trusts us.
And he is doing so while right-wing white South Africans land in the same city, not as emissaries, but as 'refugees' claiming victimhood under the very state he represents. The symbolic whiplash is staggering.
The backdrop to Ramaphosa's trip also includes a more surreal diplomatic episode: the tense Oval Office confrontation between Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky just weeks ago.
That meeting was marked by Trump's theatrical accusation that Zelensky was 'gambling with World War Three' and the Ukrainian president's desperate attempt to placate an increasingly hostile American administration. The parallel is unnerving. The White House has become a theatre where global leaders must perform for American approval whether they are trying to save their sovereignty, their trade deals, or their economic lifelines.
Ramaphosa's delegation knows that time is running out. If they cannot secure AGOA's renewal, they will at least try to delay its death. Their objective is simple: get their ducks in a row before the doors shut completely. The urgency of the visit reveals what government will not say out loud that South Africa no longer commands automatic goodwill, and that trade access is now something we must actively fight to keep.
It is a humiliating position for a country that once sold itself as the moral compass of the Global South. But perhaps it is also a necessary reckoning. South Africa cannot continue to straddle every fence siding with Russia in UN votes while calling itself a neutral broker, cosying up to China while relying on U.S. trade. That diplomatic ambivalence has now reached its limit. The AGOA negotiations will test whether we can still walk that tightrope or whether the world, much like our own neglected workers, has simply stopped listening.
Roos is a policy writer, researcher and political analyst
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The Star
40 minutes ago
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NPA's Leadership Crisis: Eroding Legal Integrity in Favour of Political Expediency
Clyde N.S. Ramalaine | Published 1 day ago Clyde N.S. Ramalaine On 3 June 2025, the Free State High Court in Bloemfontein ruled that the extradition of Moroadi Cholota from the United States to South Africa was unlawful. This landmark judgment has not only released the state's key figure in the high-profile R255 million asbestos corruption case but also cleared the way for the prosecution of others involved. Still, it has also exposed deep procedural and constitutional failings within South Africa's prosecutorial regime. Her unlawful extradition from the United States and subsequent release by the Free State High Court reveal more than just procedural oversight , they expose systemic dysfunction, a repurposing of primary objectives of the NPA as articulated in its strategic ethos within the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) and unravels the credibility of South Africa's anti-corruption drive. The Ruling A Blow to Prosecutorial Credibility Presiding over the matter, Judge Phillip Loubser was unequivocal: " The prosecution has not found reasonable doubt, or at all, that there was a valid or lawful request from South Africa for the extradition of Ms Cholota from the United States. It follows that if there was no valid extradition request, then the extradition itself was without any basis and, therefore, unlawful ." The National Prosecuting Authority's (NPA) failure to adhere to the legally mandated process in the extradition request of Moroadi Cholota reveals not merely a procedural blunder, but an institutional failing. By initiating the extradition request instead of the Minister of Justice and Correctional Services, as explicitly required by law, the NPA not only invalidated its case but compromised the integrity of South Africa's justice system on the international stage. The NPA will contend that this is not the first time it has led to extradition cases and that this is the first instance in which a case has been registered in this regard. It will furthermore argue that it is appealing the Schultz case, which constitutes a legal precedent. Notwithstanding this counter, the NPA cannot deny that this deviation from legal protocol suggests either gross incompetence or a willful disregard for constitutional processes, raising serious ethical questions about accountability within the NPA. Moreover, by allegedly providing misleading or incomplete information to U.S. authorities, the South African state stands accused of deception — a charge that, if substantiated, undermines its moral authority and diplomatic credibility, and reveals a prosecutorial body more concerned with performance politics than with the pursuit of justice. The unlawful handling of Cholota's extradition reflects a disturbing pattern in which the state weaponises legal instruments while bypassing constitutional safeguards. This erosion of legal integrity in favour of political expediency suggests the NPA, whether by design or acquiescence, has become a tool in internal power struggles rather than a guardian of justice. In failing to uphold the rule of law and misleading an international partner in the process, the NPA exposes a justice system teetering between institutional collapse and captured governance. The court's ruling on the lack of jurisdiction underscores a foundational pillar of constitutional and international law, that the legitimacy of a trial is inseparable from the legality of the accused's presence before the court. In Moroadi Cholota's case, the unlawful initiation of the extradition process rendered her transfer to South Africa constitutionally defective, thereby stripping the court of jurisdiction to try her. Any attempt to prosecute her under such conditions would not only violate Section 35 of the Constitution, which guarantees fair trial rights and due process but also contravene international legal norms governing extradition and state sovereignty. This ruling affirms that procedural integrity is not merely a technicality, but a substantive requirement of justice; the state cannot bypass lawful channels to secure an accused and still claim the authority to prosecute. To do so would be to legitimise executive overreach, dismantle legal safeguards, and invite the erosion of the rule of law under the guise of criminal justice. Systemic Indictment of the NPA The judgment handed down by the Free State High Court should not be read in isolation; it must be understood as a judicial demand for accountability, procedural discipline, and institutional humility. The NPA's failed prosecution of Ms Moroadi Cholota is, regrettably, not an isolated mishap . In a 2023 article co-authored with Paul M. Ngobeni (available at: " /", we called for the NPA leadership to be held accountable as we critically examined eight high-profile cases pursued by the NPA under the rubric of its ' state capture ' prosecutions. Our analysis revealed a pattern of endemic institutional failures, particularly under the leadership of the current National Director of Public Prosecutions, Advocate Shamila Batohi. Among the most pressing concerns were the following: Politicisation of Prosecutions The NPA's alignment with factional battles in the ANC undermines its credibility. Its selective use of the Zondo Commission's findings, non-binding and inadmissible in court, has raised alarms about the weaponisation of commissions of inquiry to serve political ends. Strategic Misuse of Evidence The collapse of cases like the Estina Dairy Farm prosecution revealed the dangers of substituting public rhetoric for admissible evidence. The NPA has repeatedly stumbled in converting politically sensational findings into courtroom success. Selective Disclosure and Narrative Framing The NPA has routinely withheld countervailing evidence, especially in asset forfeiture cases such as Optimum Coal, to curate a prosecutorial narrative while undermining procedural fairness. Civil society organisations such as Freedom Under Law and Corruption Watch have raised repeated concerns about this trend. Institutional Inefficiencies Structural deficiencies, ranging from poor leadership and resource mismanagement to political interference, continue to plague the NPA's capacity to lead credible prosecutions. These points not only relate to individual accountability but also to the need for institutional redesign. The location of the NPA under executive control remains a structural vulnerability. Lack of Accountability and Transparency The NPA has consistently deflected public criticism, painting itself as the victim of attacks rather than accepting legitimate concerns about its performance. This erodes public confidence and corrodes prosecutorial independence. Calls for an independent oversight body to scrutinise prosecutorial decisions have gained renewed urgency. NPA's Compulsive Overreliance on Appeals – Default Mechanism As expected, the NPA informed South Africa that it intends to appeal the court's findings. While the doctrine of appeal is a constitutional provision, it is important to appreciate the context and primary intentions of the state in pursuing such an appeal. A fundamental yet under-examined pathology within the National Prosecuting Authority (NPA) is its compulsive reliance on appeals, not as a last resort for justice, but as a default mechanism to shield prosecutorial ineptitude. At the heart of this phenomenon lies a psychology unmoored from accountability: senior prosecutors and executive leadership pursue prolonged legal contests not at their own personal or professional expense, but through the seemingly bottomless reservoir of the public fiscus. This distance between institutional action and individual consequence fosters a culture of indifference towards both fiscal prudence and judicial efficacy. The decision to appeal, often against the weight of legal reasoning and precedent, is thus less a matter of legal necessity than a strategic deflection—an effort to postpone institutional reckoning, preserve internal reputations, and obscure prosecutorial failures. There appears to be little regard for the economic burden imposed on the state, the rights of the accused whose lives are held in indefinite legal limbo, or the broader erosion of public trust in the justice system. In the Cholota case, this is strikingly evident: despite the court's scathing findings, the NPA has signalled its intention to appeal, oblivious to the potential litigation costs should the state be sued for unlawful detention or rights infringements. This illustrates a prosecutorial psychology that prioritises institutional face-saving over constitutional integrity, emboldened by the knowledge that the price of legal misadventure will not be borne by those who authorise it. In the final analysis, the National Director of Public Prosecutions (NDPP), Advocate Shamila Batohi, can no longer be exempt from the dismal performance of the NPA . She, together with her senior executive team, must be held accountable for the institution's persistent failures, including the frivolous pursuit of appeals and plausible wasteful expenditure incurred in cases that consistently collapse in court. The NPA's demonstrably poor track record in successfully prosecuting its claimed state capture cases, cases that fail to withstand legal scrutiny, underscores a leadership crisis at the heart of the institution. In this epoch, Batohi cannot dismiss these matters as merely 10 to 12 cases out of thousands. She must acknowledge the National Prosecuting Authority's spectacular failure in effectively prosecuting its state capture cases. Judge Loubser's ruling is a reaffirmation of the rule of law. It demonstrates that even in the face of public and political pressure, courts remain the final guardians of constitutional integrity. This case should serve as a caution to state institutions: no matter the political stakes, constitutional due process cannot be bypassed without consequence. The state's case against Moroadi Cholota symbolises both a failure of the prosecutorial machinery and a moment of constitutional reckoning. Unless the NPA undertakes urgent internal reform, beginning with depoliticised leadership appointments, independent oversight mechanisms, and full adherence to international legal procedures, its credibility will remain under siege. This case is not merely about an individual wrongfully prosecuted , but about an institution, the NPA, that appears adrift from constitutional moorings, caught between political ambition and legal obligation, often repurposed for nefarious intentions. * Clyde N.S. Ramalaine is a theologian, political analyst, lifelong social and economic justice activist, published author, poet, and freelance writer. ** The views expressed do not necessarily reflect the views of IOL or Independent Media.


Eyewitness News
an hour ago
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