Pressure is mounting on President Cyril Ramaphosa to act against lobby group AfriForum’s visits to the US. Earlier this week, AfriForum, Solidarity and the Solidarity Movement visited Trump’s Administration once again after it was announced that the US would cut funding for USAID and HIV organisations in South Africa and that the administration would promote the resettlement of “Afrikaner refugees”.
Several political parties in South Africa have called for the Afrikaner lobby group to face legal action for what they call treasonous actions.
Following the signing of the Expropriation ACT, South Africa got the short end of the stick with the Trump Administration cutting USAID and HIV funding. Although a number of dynamics come into play with the US’s latest move, some feel Afriforum and Solidarity have not helped the situation with their most recent visit to the US earlier this week.
President Cyril Ramaphosa has criticised the move.
“We need to be sending a clear message to them that as far as we are concerned as proud South Africans, we prefer that we should all stay here and solve our problems. And already what they are doing is sowing divisions in our nation and this is not a nation-building process of running around the world to try and have your problems solved, you’re just sowing divisions because now the whole of South Africans then Start looking at others negatively. I don’t think it’s the right way of handling our problems.”
The African National Congress (ANC) has also weighed in on the matter, with spokesperson Mahlengi Bhengu-Motsiri calling AfriForum’s actions “unpatriotic”.
“We therefore, call on all South Africans to isolate these right-wing races and focus on working together, tackling our challenges as a resilient nation working with our communities together. Above all, South Africa has a democratic constitution based on which government is formed. It is the government alone that has the authority to engage on behalf of South African people with any other government. Individual citizens, though, do have the right to lay charges against them. The ANC will be loath to waste valuable time needed to address national challenges or to make these races into martyrs by government charging them for treason. South Africa is going through its own challenges, but our nation remains resilient and will not be derailed,”
Earlier this week, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) also released a statement condemning AfriForum. National spokesperson Thembi Msane has called on the GNU to take action against it.
“We, therefore, call on the so-called Government of National Unity (GNU) to designate AfriForum and Solidarity Movement as domestic terrorist organizations actively working against the interests of the Republic by spreading lies and misinformation across borders. Their actions are a direct threat to the stability and sovereignty of South Africa, and they must be treated as such.”
The uMkhonto WeSizwe Party has opened a case against AfriForum, calling for it to be charged with treason.
