South Africa calls Trump’s decision to boycott G20 Summit ‘imperialist’

The South African government and the ruling African National Congress (ANC) on Sunday reacted sharply to US President Donald Trump’s decision to boycott the G20 Summit scheduled to take place in Johannesburg in a fortnight. ANC Secretary-General Fikile Mbalula criticised both Trump and US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who echoed Trump’s allegations, calling their remarks “false” and “imperialist interference.”

Trump announced on Friday that no US official would attend the Summit, which South Africa is hosting before handing over the annual G20 Presidency to the United States. He claimed the decision was in protest against what he described as the alleged persecution of white Afrikaner farmers in South Africa accusations repeatedly denied by the South African government and dismissed as unfounded by many leaders within the white community itself.

“It is a total disgrace that the G20 will be held in South Africa. Afrikaners are being killed and slaughtered, and their land and farms are being illegally confiscated. No US government official will attend as long as these human rights abuses continue,” Trump said in a strongly worded statement on Truth Social.

Rubio backed Trump on X, saying, “Afrikaners have been continuously subjected to violent racial discrimination by the South African government. I applaud this decision and support not wasting taxpayer dollars sending our diplomats to the G20 while this violence continues.”

Responding, Mbalula said, “This is a blatant lie. There is no racial discrimination taking place in South Africa. Our laws are designed to redress imbalances created by apartheid which the UN declared a crime against humanity particularly against black people. We do not take kindly to imperialist interference.”

He asserted that the Summit would proceed as planned. “We will host a successful G20 Summit with or without the United States. We are a constitutional and democratic state that believes in fair trade relations, not in the dominance of superpowers,” he said, adding that Trump was undermining South Africa’s sovereignty and distorting its democratic principles.

“We reject Donald Trump’s assertions and fabrications. His administration behaves as though South Africa is a subordinate country of the United States which is deeply unfortunate,” he said.

South Africa’s Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Ronald Lamola, also dismissed the accusations as “baseless and politically motivated,” pointing to police statistics showing that crime on farms affects both black and white South Africans.

“From April 2020 to March 2024, 225 people were victims of crime on farms in South Africa. Of these, 101 were current or former farmworkers mostly black while 53 victims were farmers, mostly white,” Lamola said, as quoted by News24.

The Department of International Relations also issued a statement calling Trump’s claims “ahistorical” and misleading, noting that Afrikaners cannot be defined as a racially exclusive group and that claims of persecution were not supported by evidence.

Analysts say tensions between South Africa and the United States have been steadily deteriorating, particularly after Trump previously offered asylum to some white farmers and imposed steep tariffs on several South African goods, significantly affecting the local economy. With just two weeks remaining before the Summit which is expected to be attended by several world leaders, concerns have emerged that some countries aligned with Trump may also consider withdrawing in the coming days.