US President Donald Trump has frozen aid freeze over South Africa's land reforms. Why is he going after South Africa, and what role does South African-born Elon Musk play?
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00:00The first two weeks of Trump's second presidency may feel like two years, especially from the
00:06African perspective.
00:07First, he cut all aid to the continent, saying he needed to reassess whether continuing to
00:14support Africa was in the US' best interest.
00:18And then, from seemingly out of nowhere,
00:30But are terrible things really happening in South Africa, or is someone in the White
00:43House leading Donald Trump up the garden path?
00:46Welcome to the Flipside.
00:49So basically, Trump wants to cut all funding to South Africa and cancel trade deals because
00:55he believes that the new expropriation act will lead to the seizure of farms in the country
01:01without compensation.
01:03The land will only be taken without compensation, firstly, after a due process through the courts
01:08and if the land is abandoned and not being used.
01:11There's an elaborate process, in fact, for reaching fair value and appropriate payment.
01:17So all governments around the world have the right to expropriate land.
01:21South Africa is no different.
01:23South African President Cyril Ramaphosa even told Trump that, quote,
01:28the recently adopted expropriation act is not a confiscation instrument.
01:33South Africa's president issued what I thought was a fairly nuanced and thoughtful response.
01:42Now if this is a standard governance practice everywhere, why is the US president so upset
01:48about it?
01:49Why does he even care?
01:50Why are you so obsessed with me?
01:52And who's drawing Trump's attention to this non-issue in South Africa?
01:58Of course, there are some people in South Africa who are unhappy with the legislation,
02:02some who have actually lobbied the US government over it, and that might be where this unhappiness
02:08is coming from, from the US government and from President Donald Trump.
02:12At the same time, there's also the issue of Trump's new top advisor, Elon Musk, who for
02:17a long time has been smearing the country where he was born and raised.
02:21Having cut nearly all ties with his native South Africa, Musk has even suggested that
02:26the white minority is being massacred and that the genocide of white people is looming.
02:34Anybody who does think that that's an extremist viewpoint, a right-wing extremist viewpoint
02:37that is not reflective of what the ANC thinks, of what the government thinks, and of generally
02:41speaking what the country thinks.
02:43Meanwhile, land restitution has been very slow in South Africa, where white citizens
02:48still own most of the land.
02:51So that land remains a meaningful and problematic issue in our country.
02:54So nobody thinks that willy-nilly Zimbabwe-style land should be stolen from white people or
02:58taken from white people.
03:00And when it comes to the myth of genocide specifically, even Julius Malema, an outspoken
03:07far-left opposition populist politician known for his combative rhetoric, says there simply
03:13is no genocide.
03:14They must be happy we're not beating them up.
03:18They must be happy we're not calling for genocide.
03:22So why would the richest man on the planet and one of the most powerful leaders in the
03:28world both fall for such disinformation and lies?
03:31Mr. Musk is, after all, supporting, in word, deed, and presumably with cash, people like
03:38the AFD party in Germany, the Reform Party in Britain, the Rightist Party in France,
03:49and other such political parties.
03:51A half-trillionaire son of the country like Musk could sign up to help social programs
03:57in South Africa instead of levelling false and frankly outrageous accusations.
04:03And that's the Flipside.