South Africa gets closer to full membership of Afreximbank
Membership of Afreximbank, as the lender with a balance sheet of $35bn (R620.80bn) is known, would give Africa's South Africa access to new trade investment products when its tariff row with the US has increased its need for new export markets.
Afreximbank has, however, in recent months been in a dispute about whether its loans to African nations should be restructured in the event of defaults.
The government said it would get a class A shareholding, meaning it would have an increased role in Afreximbank's governance.
That would include 'influence over its strategic direction, structure and leadership appointments', it said.
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The South African
3 hours ago
- The South African
Katlego klaps American 'Prince of Pan-Africanism' Umar Johnson
Among the many local YouTube and podcast commentators making waves on the local and international political scene lately is the scathing Katlego Moagi, who hosts the channel Citizen Concerned. No stranger to controversy, smears, ad hominem attacks and death threats, Katlego has relentlessly, fearlessly and articulately called out government corruption, incompetence and criminality head-on. Personally, if it were up to me… Citizen Concerned would be mandatory viewing for every Saffer over 16. Her latest thorn of contention is controversial African-American clinical psychologist and self-appointed 'Prince of Pan-Africanism' Dr Umar Johnson. Johnson was invited to SA last month by the uMkhonto weSizwe (MK) Party to give a series of talks and lectures – particularly to the youth. In a video posted last week, Moagi dissected, sliced and diced the hell out of Johnson – and his 'divisive race-baiting' message to the SA people. What follows are extracts from transcripts of Johnson's monologue videos, speeches and public utterances, and Moagi's critical responses to some of his statements. First, this is how Katlego introduced a video clip featuring Dr Johnson: MOAGI: 'This is Umar Johnson, a racist from America. He's an MK fan, supporting MK party lies. For some reason, people like this appeal to the worst of us – the most divisive and hateful people on earth. These are the ones that many of you, my brothers and sisters, look up to.' Addressing the MK Youth League at a Pan-Africanism lecture last month (where most of the audience appeared to be slumped, sleeping, yawning, shooting selfies or scrolling their phones), Johnson had this to say; JOHNSON: 'Brothers and sisters, there are a lot of wars that have to be fought in South Africa. There's a lot of wars that have to be fought across the continent…across the diaspora.' MOAGI: 'I wonder what he gets paid to come allll this way…to share this nonsense.' JOHNSON: 'Brothers and sisters in South Africa, you have to recommit yourself to the liberation of – not only South Africa – but the entire mother continent. Apartheid never fell. What happened on April 27th 1994, was a dress rehearsal for the new apartheid.' When Johnson took that message to local schools and crumbling classrooms filled with young learners, Moagi responded with: MOAGI: 'Spreading rubbish to our young people, this American fool. He's telling our young people that they are victims of white people. Meanwhile, those children are sitting in an ill-equipped classroom that they were given by the ANC. Is it the fault of white people that the ANC did not build a decent school for those children? Tell us, whose fault is it?' JOHNSON: 'There's white people all over this world and they think the world belongs to them.' MOAGI: 'Which white people are those? The white people that I give five rand to at the mall for guarding my car? The white people that I give bananas to at the traffic lights? The white people who offer to cut our grass? Which white people exactly are you talking about?' MOAGI: 'The fact is, people are not your enemies based on their colour, but based on their deeds. This man wants our people to think just like him. He is racist and he wants all of us to join him. The reason why our people suffer in this country today is not because of apartheid. It is because of the incompetence of the ANC. And by the way, the MK party you're supporting is just a different version of the same ANC.' JOHNSON: 'There's a time to play and there's a time to get serious. There's a time to have fun and a time to fight. When apartheid fell in 1994, I watched it on the television in America. I was happy. I said, 'My brothers and sisters in South Africa, they finally going to get their freedom.' Only to find out years later that it wasn't a real freedom. It was a mockery of freedom.' MOAGI: 'Our people do not suffer today because of apartheid. It is because of the corruption of the ANC. The ANC is the party that has appointed their members to be CEOs and senior ranking managers of government entities that they have no clue how to run successfully.' MOAGI: 'ANC comrades appoint a few people who overcharge for services rendered to the government and pocket the rest of the money, loads of the money. Black auditors are being murdered by black people trying to protect black tenderpreneurs who are looting state funds. There's no apartheid involved in all of that. Go back home and focus on fixing your gang culture that has destroyed your own people in America and stop spreading this racist evil propaganda here.' JOHNSON: 'Right now, the gold of South Africa don't belong to us. Right now, the diamonds of South Africa don't belong to us. Right now, the minerals of South Africa don't belong to us.' MOAGI: 'Someone please tell this American fool that the minerals of South Africa actually do belong to South Africa. The minerals of this country belong to the state, which is the custodian of all minerals, by law. Even if you own the piece of land above the minerals, you are not allowed to mine that land because what is under that land does not belong to you. It belongs to the nation of South Africa.' MOAGI: 'The only thing that has been stolen from our people at this point is the ability to think . Many of our people think like this racist Johnson. This guy is coming to South Africa to speak on behalf of the thieves destroying our country.' Katlego wrapped up her video with her usual, definitive, damning monologue; She said, 'What I want to know is, why this man is being allowed anywhere near children to speak hatred and lies to their young minds.' She added, 'Our country needs unity, not further division. Our country needs peace, not hatred.' Let us know by leaving a comment below or send a WhatsApp to 060 011 021 1. Subscribe to The South African website's newsletters and follow us on WhatsApp, Facebook, X, and Bluesky for the latest news.
Daily Maverick
3 hours ago
- Daily Maverick
Can Africa stand together against the economic disruption of Trump's tariff assault?
Some say Africa should present a unified response to US tariffs — but is that possible? It is hard to discern a continental pattern in US President Donald Trump's new 'reciprocal' import tariffs imposed on African countries last week. It is also difficult to discern whether a unified response by Africa is possible or desirable. Thirty-two of Africa's 54 nations got the global minimum rate of 10%, 18 countries got 15%, Tunisia got 25% and South Africa, Algeria and Libya got 30%. Trump's new tariff rates presented on 31 July 2025 corrected some of the grosser anomalies in his April announcement. Notably, Lesotho's astronomical tariff of 50% was reduced to 15%. But some, like South Africa's rate, stayed the same despite vigorous government lobbying to reduce it. In April, Trump imposed high tariffs on many countries, aiming to wipe out trade deficits. But the tariff amount was based on individual nations' trade deficits rather than on their actual barriers to US trade. Lesotho fell foul of the formula because it is surrounded by South Africa, and so imports most of its goods from there and very little from the US — only$2.8-million last year. Conversely, Lesotho exported a relatively large amount of goods (worth about$273.3-million) to the US, mainly garments via the African Growth and Opportunity Act, and diamonds. It is unclear how the US arrived at last week's revised tariffs, but there appeared to be no formula applied, since most African countries got 10% or 15%, apart from the four outliers. So it seems political factors played a prominent role in some cases. This is clear for South Africa, as Trump has raged against the country for its Expropriation Act and alleged 'genocide' against white Afrikaners — for which there is no evidence. Pretoria's decision to take Israel to the International Court of Justice for alleged genocide in Gaza was probably also a factor. Algeria was presumably targeted because of its hostility to Morocco, a member of Trump's Abraham Accords with Arab nations. The reason for Libya and Tunisia's high rates is unclear. Economic rationale If there is any economic rationale behind any of the tariffs, it hasn't been well thought through. Lesotho's reduction to 15% looks dramatic, but Trade and Industry Minister Mokhethi Shelile says it still leaves the country at a fatal competitive disadvantage — in the export of garments to the US — to Kenya and Eswatini especially, which got only 10% tariffs last week. Having switched its Africa policy from aid to trade, one might have expected that the US would have been sensitive to concerns like those of Lesotho — and perhaps it will still be sympathetic to Lesotho's lobbying. Although some analysts and trade experts have called for a unified African response to Trump's tariff assault, there has so far been no sign of one, either from the African Union (AU) or elsewhere. Wamkele Mene, Secretary-General of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), said African countries must unify trade policies to deal with the disruption caused by Trump's tariffs. 'The good news out of this crisis is that our heads of state understand that there is not a single market in Africa that will survive on its own,' Mene told CNBC Africa in April. 'We are not going to be able to negotiate bilaterally successfully. I think that's clear. We will have to leverage our combined efforts, our combined market size, market share and combined population size.' However Daniel Bradlow, an economic diplomacy expert at the University of Pretoria and South African Institute of International Affairs, says: 'It seems to me it's idealistic to think that the whole of 54 countries can agree on one strategy for the whole continent, and that the US would accept that. 'The problem with trying to negotiate like that is it's too easy for the US to divide and conquer,' he told ISS Today. 'It can offer Kenya or South Africa, say, too good a deal for them to say no. And that sort of breaks them away from a more unified approach. So it seems to me that that's not a very productive approach. It's more productive to try to develop the AfCFTA.' There is also a question of whether Africa could negotiate as a single entity since it does not have a continent-wide customs union or common market, so cannot have a common external tariff with an outside country. (Although sub-regional groups have negotiated free trade deals with the European Union.) Diversify markets But Bradlow is right — and Mene concurs — in proposing that Africa must now diversify its markets and strengthen intra-African trade, which remains the lowest among global regions at under 20%. And that means accelerating AfCFTA implementation, which is taking too long to get off the ground. Perhaps Trump's tariff assault will hurry them up. Few other African countries match the volume of South Africa's exports to the US, particularly when you subtract the goods exempted from the new tariffs, like oil and minerals, which are of strategic value to Washington. But we have seen how for countries like Lesotho, even relatively low values of exports are critical. And forthcoming United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, AU Commission and African Development Bank joint research suggests that new US import tariffs could reduce Africa's exports to the US by up to 21.5%. 'This goes beyond trade volumes,' says United Nations Economic Commission for Africa Executive Secretary Claver Gatete. 'It affects industrial jobs, regional supply chains and Africa's voice in shaping the terms of engagement.' He urged countries to mobilise domestic resources to withstand a deteriorating external environment of rising tariffs and falling aid. Although individual African states are continuing to negotiate with the US, the focus is beginning to shift from mitigation to adaptation. South Africa, for instance, is establishing an Export Support Desk to help firms cope, and announced it would implement measures to cushion the blow for key affected industries like autos and agriculture. Meanwhile, America's aggressive protectionism offers an opportunity for its chief global rival China, which is throwing African countries a lifeline by dropping import tariffs for nearly all of them, Nigerian economist Bismarck Rewane told CNN. Still it's hard to do without the world's largest economy. Perhaps the best Africa and the world can hope for is that the pandemonium caused by Trump's trade policy will boomerang on America — as seems to be happening already — and force him to recant. Meanwhile, African countries should accelerate AfCFTA's implementation and strengthen their domestic economies against this perfect storm of rising tariffs and plunging aid. DM
The Herald
3 hours ago
- The Herald
South Africa gets closer to full membership of Afreximbank
South Africa moved closer to becoming a full sovereign member of the Africa Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank), the continent's leading provider of trade finance, after the cabinet approved the plan, the government said on Thursday. Membership of Afreximbank, as the lender with a balance sheet of $35bn (R620.80bn) is known, would give Africa's South Africa access to new trade investment products when its tariff row with the US has increased its need for new export markets. Afreximbank has, however, in recent months been in a dispute about whether its loans to African nations should be restructured in the event of defaults. The government said it would get a class A shareholding, meaning it would have an increased role in Afreximbank's governance. That would include 'influence over its strategic direction, structure and leadership appointments', it said.
