We’ll not let Trump whitewash the history of apartheid in South Africa

In a blatant attempt to whitewash the history of apartheid in South Africa, Donald Trump accused South Africa of genocide against white South Africans. Therefore, he sent a private plane to bring 59 White South Africans for resettlement in the United States. Trump’s claim that this was to correct the ‘egregious’ actions of the Republic of South Africa is a gross misrepresentation of the truth.

His empowerment of this action with Executive Order 14202 is an apparent injustice that we cannot allow to go unchallenged. Allowing it to happen without a challenge is an affront to the years of the fight against apartheid and Nelson Mandela’s legacy.  

Here is what Trump did. On February 7, 2025, he signed Executive Order 14202. According to Trump, the executive order attempts to address the “egregious” actions of the Republic of South Africa. In section one, he states that the South African government disregards its citizens’ rights. Trump claims that the South African government created the Expropriation Act 13 to enable it to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners’ agricultural property without compensation. Donald Trump’s interpretation of the Expropriation Act 13 is fundamentally flawed. 

In January 2025, President Cyril Ramaphosa signed the Act into law after a protracted debate in the South African House. This Act, like similar laws in many other countries, including the United States, allows the government to take land for public use. The Expropriation Act 13 in South Africa is a fair and just law. It enables the government to seize land from any private owner, regardless of colour, for public purposes and interests. The law provides fair compensation, but the government can also seize land without compensation. In support of the Act, the African National Congress, ANC, defended it as necessary to correct past injustices of the apartheid years.  

If we go back to 1975, in the thick of apartheid, the South African House passed the first Expropriation Act. When apartheid ended in 1994, White South Africans owned 85 percent of the arable land in South Africa. Today, they own 72 percent of agricultural land despite being only 7.3 percent of the population. The ANC argues that this is part of the past injustices that the new Expropriation Act urgently seeks to correct. So, when Donald Trump says that the government is confiscating agricultural property from White South Africans, he is being disingenuous.  

In the same Executive Order 14202, Donald Trump stated that South Africa has aggressively opposed the United States and its allies. He said that South Africa accused Israel of genocide instead of holding Hamas accountable for the attack that killed 1,200 and took another 252 Israelis hostage. On October 7, 2023, Hamas and other Palestinian militants attacked Southern Israel in the first invasion of the Israeli territory since the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. South Africa and the rest of the world swiftly and justly condemned the attack on Israel.  

It has been more than a year, and the war in Gaza rages. According to the Gaza Health Ministry and other sources, the number of Palestinians killed since October 7, 2023, has exceeded 50,000. The conflict has also displaced more than 1.9 million people in Gaza. In response, the South African government sued Israel at the International Court of Justice to order Israel to stop the assault on Rafah. In the lawsuit, the South African government alleged that Israel is committing genocide against Palestinians in Gaza.Trump said that the lawsuit is against the interests of the United States and its allies. Therefore, he wants South Africa to pay for its “egregious” actions. What he missed is what prompted South Africa to go to court on behalf of Palestinians in Gaza.  

In bringing the lawsuit, South Africa says, as a signatory to the UN’s 1948 genocide convention, it must act. It also sees a similarity between the struggles of Palestinians in Gaza and the fight against apartheid. “As a people who once tasted the bitter fruits of dispossession, discrimination, racism, and state-sponsored violence, we are clear that we will stand on the right side of history,” says Cyril Ramaphosa, the President of South Africa.

In a recent visit to the White House, Ramaphosa said that there is no genocide in South Africa. Yet, Trump doubled his claim and presented videos and news articles as proof. The problem is that many of the videos and news articles he presented are from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where the real genocide is happening. Since 1996, more than six million people have died in Congo, millions more have been displaced, and the world has looked the other way. If Trump is passionate about fighting genocide, Congo would have been a good starting point. He passed on Congo because the impacted people do not fit the profile of what he considers real human beings.  

To understand why Trump flew in 59 White South Africans in a private plane for resettlement in the United States, you must look at the politics of it. During his campaign, he told Americans that he would rid the country of illegal immigrants. Trump, without evidence, accused countries of sending their criminals to the United States. He specifically said that Congo had opened its prisons and allowed its criminals to come into the United States. Since his second term, Trump has deported thousands of immigrants from Latin America and Africa, even students with legal status. But he is willing to replace them with White South Africans, who are some of the privileged in Africa. Trump had accused Democrats of relying on immigrants’ votes to win elections. In his mind, deporting immigrants from Africa and Latin America is a strategy to reduce votes for Democrats. Back in his first term, in January 2018, in a White House meeting on immigration reform, Trump asked: “Why are we having these people from shithole countries come here.” He is consistent with his dislike for people who are not White.  

While running for the second time, at a dinner party in Mar-a-Lago, Trump bemoaned the lack of immigrants from Denmark, Switzerland, and other places he refers to as “nice” countries, who are primarily White. The problem for Trump is that citizens of Denmark and Switzerland are not as destitute as Africans. Therefore, they are less likely to move to the United States on a whim. Otherwise, Trump will bring them in droves to the United States.  

Trump’s willingness to bring White South Africans for resettlement in the United States has nothing to do with genocide; it has to do with race, politics, and the MAGA agenda. Do not be deceived. There is nothing ideological about Trump’s immigration policy. He may try to rewrite the history of apartheid in South Africa, but we will not let him get away without a challenge.

•Odunze, a public opinion analyst, wrote from Lagos