Parliament, Wednesday, 14 May 2025 – The Chairperson of the Portfolio Committee on International Relations and Cooperation, Mr Supra Mahumapelo, has noted with dismay the departure of 49 Afrikaners to the United States as the beneficiaries of a resettlement programme instigated by President Donald Trump and arising out of falsehood and propaganda that the South African government has seized land from white Afrikaners and is not doing enough to protect their rights.
According to media reports, South Africans arrived in the US on Monday as the first batch of Afrikaners to be granted ”refugee status” in the US on the basis that they have been persecuted and had their land confiscated. These claims are unfounded and have been dismissed out of hand since they were first spread in the US by disgruntled white South Africans.
Mr Mahumapelo said he is shocked by this development. What is even more concerning, he said, is the fallacious and unfounded stories on which the refugee status has been granted. “It is regrettable that the US still believes this to the extent of granting these Afrikaner South Africans refugee status,” he said.
“Those who have fled were not being persecuted. They are not being hounded, they are not being treated badly and they are leaving ostensibly because they don’t want to embrace the changes that are taking place in our country in accordance with our constitution,” President Ramaphosa told a panel discussion in Ivory Coast on Monday. “We think that the American government has got the wrong end of the stick here, but we’ll continue talking to them.”
Late last year, the President signed into law legislation that will make it easier for the government to expropriate land without paying for it, if it is in the public interest to do so to ensure equitable access to land. The government has not expropriated any property so far.
Mr Mahumapelo is concerned that this development has occurred at the same time as President Ramaphosa is working to repair the damage caused by unpatriotic South African Afrikaners and other opponents of a non-racial and unified South Africa to the usually healthy diplomatic and trade relations between South Africa and the US.
“We are calling on President Ramaphosa to continue his efforts for healthy and meaningful relations between South Africa and US,” emphasised Mr Mahumapelo.
ISSUED BY THE PARLIAMENTARY COMMUNICATION SERVICES ON BEHALF OF THE CHAIRPERSON OF THE PORTFOLIO COMMITTEE ON INTERNATIONAL RELATIONS AND COOPERARION, MR SUPRA MAHUMAPELO.
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