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IOL News
3 days ago
- Politics
- IOL News
Liberation History: AfriForum's Desperate Bid to Distort Struggle Heritage
Then Deputy President Thabo Mbeki (R) hands over the African National Congress (ANC) submission to Archbishop Desmond Tutu, head of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC), in Cape Town May on 12, 1997. Anyone who claims that singing "Kill the boer, Kill the farmer' is tantamount to declaring war against the Boers is irrational, unreasonable, and disingenuous, says the writer. Image: AFP Prof. Bheki Mngomezulu THE recent trip by President Cyril Ramaphosa and his delegation to America produced different results for different people. The official position from the government is that the trip was meant to restart trade relations between South Africa and America. As such, proponents of this view argue that the trip was a huge success. However, a counterview is that the trip caused more harm than good to South Africa's global image. According to this view, some of the utterances made at the Oval Office were unwarranted, factually flawed, and devoid of context. Apart from the questionable pictures of the graves which allegedly carried the bodies of Afrikaners killed in South Africa (who were not from South Africa), there were other developments which happened in that meeting. One of them was when Agriculture Minister John Steenhuizen told President Trump that the reason for the DA to join the coalition government led by Ramaphosa was solely to keep the EFF and MKP away from the Union Buildings. This raised questions about the honesty in the formation of the coalition government. The climax of the Oval Office meeting was when Trump played a video of Julius Malema singing his famous song 'Kill the Boer, the Farmer' and the other song which was sung by former President Jacob Zuma, which says 'Sizobadubula ngo mbayimbayi' [We are going to shoot them with artillery]. I will focus on Julius Malema's song because it is the one that has caused controversy. Even people who are supposed to know better fell into the trap of Trump's propaganda. The question becomes: does this song represent symbolic relevance or is it a violation of human rights and an instigator of racial violence? To answer this question, political expediency and political parochialism will not offer any assistance. Only objectivity, rationality, and context will assist in arriving at a credible conclusion. Firstly, this is a struggle song which was not composed by Malema. The late Peter Mokaba used to sing this song and dance but he never killed any Boer or Afrikaner. In fact, as he sang this song, no one went on a rampage killing Afrikaners following the song's lyrics. So, anyone who claims that singing this song is tantamount to declaring war against the Boers is irrational, unreasonable, and disingenuous. Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Next Stay Close ✕ Secondly, there have already been rulings on the singing of this song. Between 2016 and 2019, Malema sang this song six times on different occasions. In 2020, Afriforum approached the Gauteng Equality Court asking it to declare the song hate speech. The court dismissed this claim. Exercising its right, AfriForum proceeded to the Supreme Court of Appeal to try its luck. To this organisation's surprise, on 24 May 2024, the Supreme Court dismissed AfriForum's appeal. In its judgement, the Court stated that 'Mr Malema was doing no more than exercising his right to freedom of expression.' It went further to implore AfriForum to see the song in its correct context. In a nutshell, the Court implicitly concluded that AfriForum was driven by political expediency when it laid charges against Malema, not to unite the nation. There was no intention to get justice. Instead, the motivating factor was for AfriForum to be seen as being politically relevant. Not even the Constitutional Court could agree with the argument advanced by Afriforum. It dismissed Afriforum's application for leave to appeal, arguing that the application 'bears no reasonable prospects of success.' Out of desperation, AfriForum approached President Ramaphosa asking him to condemn the singing of the song. The organisation was once again disappointed when Ramaphosa referred it to the courts which had already ruled on the matter. Given this history, a few questions arise. Why did Trump play Malema's video singing this song? Was his intention to prove that Afrikaners are being killed in South Africa or was he simply playing a mind's game to test Ramaphosa's delegation? To what extent did Ramaphosa and his team rise above such petty politics? Was the President correct in telling Trump that 'this is not the view of government' and that Malema's EFF was not part of the coalition government? Was this necessary? A nation which abandons its history is as good as dead. It is for this reason that some universities in America insist that regardless of the qualifications students are pursuing, they are forced to take some history modules. This is done to ensure that they do not operate in a vacuum but understand the historical context. Struggle songs are part of the South African heritage. They remind all of us about the history of this country. South Africa became a democracy in 1994. However, to this day, the song 'Mhla libuyayo kuyobe kunzima' [when our land comes back, it will be tough] is still being sung for different reasons. It continues to say 'kuyokhala uBotha, kuqhume umbayimbayi' [there will be a cry from Botha, and there will be an explosion of artillery].
Daily Maverick
25-05-2025
- Politics
- Daily Maverick
State Security Agency should have warned Ramaphosa about Trump's false ‘farm murder crosses'
Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni says the State Security Agency should have briefed Cyril Ramaphosa beforehand on the display of white crosses that US President Donald Trump showed him last week to try to back up false accusations of a white genocide in South Africa. Earlier this month, on 13 May 2025, Elon Musk retweeted a video showing aerial footage of a row of white crosses alongside a road. The words accompanying the post he retweeted were: 'Each cross represents a white farmer who was murdered in South Africa. 'And some people still deny that white South Africans/Boers are persecuted and say they don't deserve asylum because they are white.' The crosses were in fact linked to a couple murdered in a robbery in KwaZulu-Natal about five years ago – and the crime was not racially motivated. Musk's post said: 'So many crosses.' His retweet was shared about 52,000 times. So many crosses — Elon Musk (@elonmusk) May 13, 2025 Now, Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni says the State Security Agency (SSA), based on Musk's post, should have anticipated that US President Donald Trump would show the same footage of the crosses during President Cyril Ramaphosa's visit to the White House last week. In a long and detailed statement issued on Sunday, 25 May 2025, she referred to the crosses and several other issues relating to Ramaphosa's recent US visit. 'Burial sites' misinformation During Ramaphosa's visit, Trump showed him a video montage, including footage of the crosses. Trump, who has peddled the false idea that there is a white Afrikaner genocide in South Africa, said: 'Now this is very bad. These are burial sites right here. Burial sites. Over a thousand of white farmers… 'Each one of those white things you see is a cross and there's approximately a thousand of them. They were all white farmers. The family of white farmers… 'It's a terrible sight. I've never seen anything like it. Both sides of the road, you have crosses. Those people were all killed.' Ramaphosa wanted to know if Trump knew where the footage had been taken, as he had not seen it before. Trump simply said that it had been taken in South Africa – Ramaphosa said he would find out. 'SSA should have known' Ntshavheni, in her statement on Sunday, said News24 had fact-checked Trump's claim about the white crosses. Daily Maverick has also fact-checked claims, including about the crosses, Trump made during Ramaphosa's visit. Rebecca Davis reported: 'The white crosses were erected along the road in Newcastle, KwaZulu-Natal, in 2020 as a protest against the murder of Glen and Vida Rafferty on their farm. 'The crosses have since been removed.' As for News24, its article said: 'The footage does not show burial sites… The crosses did not only represent white farmers.' In her statement on Sunday, Ntshavheni said she had been unable to relay information about the crosses, as conveyed to her via the SSA, to Ramaphosa when Trump had shown him the footage. This was because of 'the lack of gadgets' – presumably, the lack of cellphones on hand during the meeting. 'Should the SSA have anticipated that display, given that Elon tweeted about it on 14 May?' Ntshaveni said. 'Most definitely, and it is an area that the SSA must never fail the President on their briefing to him again,' Ntshavheni's statement said. (Daily Maverick established Musk retweeted footage of the crosses on 13 May.) 'Not graves' Last week, when releasing South Africa's latest crime statistics, Police Minister Senzo Mchunu also referred to the crosses footage. 'The picture of many crosses on both sides of a dirt road between Newcastle and Normandien in KwaZulu-Natal flows from a Normandien-registered case,' he said. 'The incident sparked a very strong protest by the farming community in the area. The crosses symbolised killings on farms over years; they are not graves,' Mchunu added. 'And it was unfortunate that those facts got twisted to fit a false narrative about crime in South Africa.' 'Diplomatic courtesies' In her statement on Sunday, Ntshavheni referred to several other issues relating to Ramaphosa's US visit. She said Ramaphosa had been respectfully received. 'This working visit is one of those where better diplomatic courtesies were accorded to our President,' Ntshavheni said. 'President Ramaphosa is the first African head of state and government to be invited to the White House in this second term of the Trump administration. 'It is not only the significance of the invitation that matters, it is the issues the two leaders discussed beyond South Africa's domestic issues.' She said Ramaphosa and Trump had 'compared notes on their approaches towards ending the Russia-Ukraine conflict.' Ntshavheni reiterated that during discussions over lunch and at the Oval Office, relations had been respectful. 'There were no signs of the impatience the world had witnessed during other recent visits to the White House,' she said. DM
AFP
22-05-2025
- Politics
- AFP
Video of S.Africa crosses screened by Donald Trump shows 2020 protest, not ‘burial sites'
The 4:30-minute video presentation contained several falsehoods, which AFP wrote about here. The video, made up of a compilation of clips, was also published by the White House's official account on X. It closed with a long aerial shot of the white crosses, played from an X post by an account called @realMaalouf. The post's text read: "Each cross represents a white farmer that was murdered in South Africa. And some people still deny that white South Africans/Boers are persecuted and say they don't deserve asylum because they are white." The account published the video on May 12, 2025. Image Screenshot of the X post by @realMaalouf Other posts that shared the video claimed that each cross represented a white farmer killed between 2018 and 2022 or 2023. While playing the footage at the White House, Trump commented: "These are burial sites. Right here, burial sites. Over a thousand white farmers." He added: "Those cars are…stopped there to pay their respects to their family members who were killed." The footage does not, however, show burial sites. Video from 2020 protest By conducting reverse image searches taken from the video, AFP found local media articles which explained that the video showed a protest on September 5, 2020, near Newcastle in South Africa's KwaZulu-Natal province (archived here). According to these reports, symbolic wooden crosses were erected along the road where protesters took part in a procession of vehicles that included tractors, trucks, motorcycles, and helicopters. Image Screenshot of a 2020 article on the procession The procession was in protest against farm killings after a couple from the Normandien region were found murdered on their farm (archived here). The murderers were convicted to life imprisonment in 2022 (archived here). BBC Verify geolocated the footage to a spot near Newcastle, a town in KwaZulu-Natal province. Google Street View imagery showed matching roads, foliage, and hills in the distance. The latest available imagery, from 2023 -- some three years after the protest -- showed that the crosses were no longer in place. BBC named Rob Hoatson as the person who organised the display of white crosses back in 2020 and cited him as confirming that the convoy was not a "burial site" but a "temporary memorial" and that the crosses have since been removed (archived here). Online, some commenters linked the video the Witkruis Monument memorial site, which also features crosses symbolising farm deaths, but is located some 500 kilometres away from where the 2020 procession occurred. South Africa recorded more than 27,600 murders in the 2023/24 financial year, according to police data, which averages to just over 75 a day. Most of the victims were young, black men in urban areas, the statistics show. On farms, plots, small holdings and other agricultural land, there were 436 murders in 2024, according to police figures that include farmers -- who are mostly white -- and black farm workers. Statistics from the Transvaal Agricultural Union of South Africa (TAU SA) show farm murders average about 50 a year across all races. AFP Fact Check previously looked into how false data has distorted the complex picture of South African farm murders. During Ramaphosa's visit, Trump also brandished a stack of printed articles that he claimed documented a genocide taking place against white people in South Africa. Mixed into the deck of papers, however, was a months-old blog post featuring a photo from the Democratic Republic of Congo, as AFP reported here (archived here). Image US President Donald Trump shows an article featuring a photo from the Democratic Republic of Congo as he meets with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, DC, on May 21, 2025 (AFP / Jim WATSON) A group of around 50 white South Africans (archived here) arrived in the United States for resettlement on May 12, 2025, after Trump granted them refugee status as victims of what he called a "genocide". Trump essentially halted refugee arrivals after taking office, but is making an exception for the Afrikaners despite Pretoria's insistence that they do not face persecution in their homeland.
Yahoo
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
How Trump's Oval Office became a danger zone for world leaders
The entrance to the Oval Office doesn't have a 'caution' sign hanging overhead, but if two recent meetings with foreign leaders are indication, it might need one. South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky each found themselves on the receiving end of presidential tirades during their respective visits to Washington. And as Axios reports, that's making foreign leaders think twice about making a trip that's traditionally been seen as a chance to earn goodwill with the Most Powerful Person on Earth and street cred with the voters back home. Ramaphosa came to Washington on Wednesday looking for a reset in relations between the U.S. and his nation. Trump, acting at the urging of tech billionaire Elon Musk, who'd pushed disputed claims of 'white genocide," cut off aid to South Africa, sent the country's ambassador packing, and put white Afrikaners on the fast track for refugee status, Axios reported. Likely with Zelensky in mind, Ramaphosa brought South African golfing legends Ernie Els and Retief Goosen along with him to meet the famously golf-mad president and act as a buffer. The meeting began with a lighter mood, and Trump warmly greeted Ramaphosa outside the North Portico before they moved into the Oval Office, The Washington Post reported. Read More: Trump's meeting with South African president spirals into false claims That worked — until it didn't. Trump hinted at potential problems ahead. 'He is a man who is certainly, in some circles, really respected. Other circles, a little bit less respected. Like all of us, in all fairness,' he said, making clear that the meeting was coming at Ramaphosa's request, according to The Post. Things took a turn about 20 minutes into the session, when Trump asked for the lights to be dimmed so he could show Ramaphosa a five-minute compilation video involving incitement against whites by extremist politicians whom Ramaphosa opposes, Axios reported. The video included footage of crosses and earthen mounds that he said represented more than 1,000 grave sites of murdered farmers, The Post reported. The mounds were, in fact, part of a protest against the violence, not actual graves. Ramaphosa stared straight ahead, wiping his face and occasionally moving in his seat and looking over at Trump, who wouldn't make eye contact as a clip played of crowds repeatedly shouting 'Kill the Boers,' a reference to White farmers descended from colonists who built and led the nation's racist apartheid regime, according to The Post. Trump then flipped through a stack of news printouts describing such attacks. The meeting continued for 30 more minutes. And unlike Zelensky, Ramaphosa wasn't bounced from the Oval Office. It's important to pause here and note that other world leaders, including Canadian Premier Mark Carney have held their own during visits to Trump's White House, Axios reported. But the online news org noted, these public embarrassment sessions are starting to look like a trend. The bottom line, according to Axios? If you're a world leader and get an Oval Office invite, 'enter at your own risk.' Trump trolls Bruce Springsteen with golf video in latest social media attack Trump admin turns sights on 'activist' Mass. judge who said deportation defied court order Here's who's on the ballot for Boston mayor, City Council — so far Judge blocks Trump administration's mass layoffs at the Education Department Treasury Department phasing out pennies, following Trump order Read the original article on MassLive.
Gulf Insider
22-05-2025
- Politics
- Gulf Insider
Trump Shows Clip to Ramaphosa, Clashes with Reporter
Well, for those who were anticipating a Vance-Zelensky shitshow redux at today's meeting between US President Trump and South African President Ramaphosa… they were not disappointed. As the topic of white genocide cam up, Ramaphosa was quick to dispel the 'conspiracy'; but Trump very quickly told his aides to 'roll the tape' at which videos of black leaders in South Africa calling for the murder of whites (Boers) along with video of burial sites for whites killed in South Africa. Crushing. This is not only painful for the South African President but also for our mainstream media that desperately wants to cover up black-on-white violence in South Africa — Dinesh D'Souza (@DineshDSouza) May 21, 2025 As the chants of 'kill the Boer' rang around The Oval Office, Ramaphosa grew very uncomfortable: Donald Trump playing video footage of South Africa's black party singing 'kill the Boer (Whites), kill the White farmer" in front of the South African president in the Oval Office. South African president is very uncomfortable. — Charlie Spiering (@charliespiering) May 21, 2025 Ramaphosa, thoughtfully and quietly responded claiming that 'this is not government policy,' adding that 'our democracy allows for free expression' and reaffirmed that 'our government is completely against' what President Trump was describing. Trump responded: 'You have hundreds of people, thousands of people trying to come into our country because they feel they're going to be killed and their land is going to be confiscated, and you do have laws that were passed that give you the right to confiscate land.' As the clip (of burial sites and 100,000 people chanting for death to whites) ended and Trump turned to the reporter pool, NBC News reporter Peter Alexander shouted a question about the Qatari jet being offered to the US DoD, at which Trump exploded… NBC: 'The Pentagon announced it would be accepting a Qatari jet to be used…' TRUMP: 'WHAT are you talking about? You know, you ought to GET OUT of here! What does this have to do with the Qatari jet?' 'We're talking about a lot of other things. It's NBC trying to GET OFF the subject of what you just saw [white genoc*de].' 'For you to go into a [different] subject […] Go back. You ought to go back to your studio at NBC because Brian Roberts and the people that run that place, they ought to be investigated. They are so terrible, the way you run that network. And you're a DISGRACE. No more questions from you.' WATCH: President Trump unloaded on NBC News correspondent Peter Alexander after a question about a Qatari jet that is expected to be given to the U.S. to be used as a new Air Force One. — The Hill (@thehill) May 21, 2025 Ramaphosa (who handled the confrontation far better than Zelensky) diplomatically suggested to Trump that they take this discussion private, away from the media (by which point Trump had made his point and the world was now aware of Julius Malema's death chants and all talk of conspiracy was immediately dismissed). Apart from at CNN… A South African journalist appeared on CNN today, saying South African political leaders calling for the killing of white Afrikaners would 'potentially appear to be more literal' for people lacking 'historical context'. — DeVory Darkins (@devorydarkins) May 21, 2025 'Context', always context. Context this!!!! 🚨 JUST SHOWN IN THE OVAL OFFICE: Proof of Persecution in South Africa. — The White House (@WhiteHouse) May 21, 2025 Also read: 'It Went Very Well' – Trump Sees Imminent 'End To The War' After Two-Hour-Call With Putin
