South Africa Bishops urge racial healing as Trump condemns country’s land policy
February 21, 2025 | Silas Isenjia, catholicnewsagency.com
ACI Africa, Feb 21, 2025 / 11:50 am
The Justice and Peace Commission
of the Southern African Catholic Bishops’ Conference (SACBC) has called
for “racial reconciliation” in response to ongoing land reform disputes
causing tension between South Africa and the United States government.
In
early February, South Africa President Cyril Ramaphosa reportedly
signed the Expropriation Act into law, permitting the government there
to seize land without compensation. This policy aims to address
historical land disparities favoring the country’s white minority.
President
Donald Trump criticized the move, stating: “South Africa is
confiscating land and treating certain classes of people very badly.” In
response, he issued an executive order suspending all aid to South
Africa, citing concerns over alleged discrimination against white
Afrikaners.
In an interview with the SACBC communication office, the
director of the SACBC Justice and Peace Commission, Father Stan Muyebe,
OP, said the recent dispute between the two governments has reopened the
wounds of land injustices during the apartheid era in the southern
African nation.
He said that South Africa is still trying to recover from its “painful past of apartheid, painful history for a lot of people.”
The
development in South Africa concerning land, he said, “is a very
complex and very sensitive issue that calls for genuine reconciliation.”
“Racial
reconciliation in South Africa cannot be comprehensive if the land
matter is not handled properly,” Muyebe said in a Feb. 17 interview. He
decried what he described as the “manufacturing of facts and
misrepresentation” surrounding South Africa’s post-apartheid land
reform, calling it a highly sensitive issue that has been “unfortunately
exploited by recent developments in global geopolitics.”
“Hearing
what has been presented by the United States, but also in the media,
there are some aspects that are facts, but there’s also manufacturing of
facts, misrepresentation,” he said.
Muyebe made reference to the
country’s constitution and explained that any land restitution should
not undermine food security or economic productivity.
He said further
in reference to the constitution: “Although the government has
introduced new legislation to accelerate land redistribution,
controversy remains regarding the extent and manner of compensation.”
“We
are confident that this matter will be addressed when the legislation
is taken for review at the constitutional court, which will most likely
happen,” the priest said.
Muyebe expressed optimism that the planned
national dialogue on land reforms in South Africa would provide a
collective solution to land issues and other areas of contention in the
country.
According to a Reuters report, the U.S. administration’s
disapproval of South Africa’s land reform policies has jeopardized the
African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA), a trade agreement allowing
South African agricultural products tariff-free access to U.S. markets.
According
to the report, the potential revocation of AGOA benefits could
adversely affect South African industries, including wine and citrus
producers. Some U.S. lawmakers advocate for terminating AGOA benefits
due to South Africa’s land policies, arguing that the reforms
discriminate against white farmers.
In the Feb. 17 interview with the
SACBC communications office, Muyebe also weighed in on the suspension
of U.S. foreign aid to South Africa, describing the move as a wake-up
call to African leaders to address “dependency” and “find a way in which
critical programs that we have in Africa should be funded internally.”
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