What's South Africa’s controversial land law, and why is Trump involved?
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Hello, I'm Hannah Gelbart and you're listening to What in the World from the BBC World Service. Today we're talking about land ownership in South Africa and how US President Donald Trump has incorrectly accused the government there of confiscating land from white people. The South African situation is very, very dangerous and very bad for a lot of people.

There's tremendously bad things going on, including the confiscation of property. He's frozen foreign aid to the country as a result and has threatened to cut off all future funding to South Africa. So how did we get here?

Well, here to talk us through it is BBC journalist, Carnie Sharp. Hi, Carnie. Hi, Hannah. Thank you for having me. Thank you for coming into the studio. I want to start off with the Expropriation Act, which is what this whole big spat is about. It was signed into law in South Africa just last month after a five-year consultation process. What exactly is the Act? Right.

Right. Now, I want to start off by saying that this can sound complicated, but we're going to try and simplify it as much as possible. So the Land Expropriation Act that was signed in by the president in January is basically, it basically cancels out a law that was signed in 1975.

And the current law that has been signed is a law that brings into alignment the democratic South Africa with land ownership in the country. Now, in 1975, the government could revoke land for its purposes. What you find within the South African context is that the majority of farmland is owned by the white minority, and they only make up 7% of the population.

80% of the population who are black only own 4%. Now, this law doesn't look to redress land reform. That's a separate process within the South African context altogether. But basically, what it does with the Land Expropriation Act is allowing the government now to take away land

only under agreement with landowners in South Africa. So, for example, if a white farmer owns a land, the South African government will negotiate a deal with them to take away land in the public interest. What does that mean? So if the country wants to build schools or bridges or a stadium or anything to benefit the public, they will then go to the landowner. If that land is not being used, a white farmer, for example, and say,

Can we negotiate a deal where we will pay you for this land and we will take it back from you? I think the reason as to why people were getting so nervous about this was that within the Land Expropriation Act that Cyril Ramaphosa had signed in, it did say that in some circumstances there won't be any compensation, so farmers wouldn't get paid for it. And I think that's where everyone around the world, it seems, is.

panicked, but the judiciary still has the final say. Those negotiations will be done. And only in extreme cases will that happen. There has been so much outrage to this on social media, hasn't there, as you say. But this isn't the only country. South Africa is not the only country that has a law like

this? Absolutely. Almost every country in the world, you would assume, has a land expropriation law. And that only means that in cases where the government feels there's a need to use a land in a way that it sees would be beneficial to the majority of the people, that then law gets implemented.

Now, I want to dig into the issue of land ownership in South Africa because it is such a contentious issue there. Most private farmland is still owned by white people and that is 30 years after the end of apartheid. That was the racist system that treated black people differently to white people, kept black people separate from white people in poorer conditions, fewer opportunities, and it came to an end in 1994. Hi, Nelson Hodesasa Mandela.

Do hereby swear to be faithful to the Republic of South Africa. So, Kani, is this act a way to try and address land reform and to deal with these past injustices of racial segregation? In a way, and you could argue that it does, because again, when you look at who owns land in South Africa, it is still the white minority. But South Africa still has separate land reform processes, which it tries to deal with under those processes.

As a South African as well, when I go back to South Africa, it's very evident who owns the better part of South Africa's land. So the beneficiaries of land within the South African context, even 30 years after apartheid,

are still the white minority. So in a way, yes, if the government here has a little bit more control in terms of taking back land for the benefit of the majority of the people, then you'd see that then as a just way forward to bring it in line with South Africa's constitution, which basically emphasises that, you know, South Africa belongs to all people, all the people that live in it. And how do South Africans feel about this act?

Now, this is so interesting. So when Cyril Ramaphosa did bring it, you know, sign it into law in January, there was a bit of panic back home. You know, you had parties like the other biggest opposition party, which now serves within the South African government as part of the GNU, the United Government, if you like. They were opposed to it because they saw it as unconstitutional. But I think...

It's quite strange in a way because this issue with the United States has basically forced South Africans themselves to

to dig deep and understand what the Expropriation Act is all about. And it's fascinating because at the end of the day, the democratic alliances have now come up against the United States and said, actually, there's a big misunderstanding. What's happening now within South Africa is that they've come to understand what the Expropriation Act is. They see the need for that. And the majority of South Africans, Hannah, would support something like this because it is about injustice and it is about correcting in a way

you know, over 40 years of the racist apartheid laws. So I want to talk a little bit more about how the US has got involved in all of this. So there's the billionaire businessman Elon Musk, who was, of course, born and raised in South Africa. He's President Donald Trump's right hand man, close advisor. What has he said about all of this?

Well, this is so interesting because, you know, up till now, when I say to people, do you know Elon Musk was born in South Africa? And they go, really? I didn't know that. So he left in his late teens, right? So, yeah, here's the world's richest man in the world. Now, a member, as we know from what we are hearing and what we're seeing, member of Trump's, President Trump's inner circle. Now, Musk has described South Africa as,

as having racist ownership laws. This is how it all started, accusing the government of doing too little to stop what he has referred to as a genocide against white farmers, which is not true. Genocide is a very strong word. It is, but he still managed to use that. And then there is a group called AfriForum, which acts on behalf of white Afrikaners generally, who are a right-wing group. It's

It seems as if we don't know, this is an allegation, we don't know whether they have direct contact with anyone within the US government, but it seems to have the ear of someone like Elon Musk. Now, whilst white farmers in South Africa are killed, they are not more racially targeted than anyone else within South Africa. And we do know that South Africa does have fairly high murder rates.

And Trump and Musk are both, of course, incredibly vocal on social media. Donald Trump on Truth Social, Elon Musk on X. So I want to go through a couple of the things that they have said online. We're going to do a quick fire round. Can you tell me if these statements are true or false?

So first of all, right, Trump on Truth Social said South Africa has been in, quote, confiscating land and treating certain classes of people very badly. Strong faults. Now, that's that's incorrect, because that expropriation law act, which has been interpreted by the US administration and by Elon Musk,

through misinformation, says that this is what is happening. But that is categorically not happening within the South African context. OK, another one for you. Elon Musk on X in 2023 said, in quotes, they're actually killing white farmers every day. It's not just a threat. That is...

How do I say? So it's not a strong false. It is partly true. But white farmers being killed every day is a little bit of a stretch. So white farmers, you know, will be killed along with every other South African who is on the other...

is on the receiving end of opportunistic thieves or people who are seeking, you know, cash or money, but they're not being targeted for sure. We know that killings, again, within the South African context is pretty high, but they're not racially targeted. So that definitely is false. And

And finally, also on X, in February, Elon Musk asked, in quotes, why do you have openly racist ownership laws? So, you know, I mean...

Again, that's absolutely false. Was he referring to the apartheid era? Because that would have been a space or an era where there were openly racist ownership laws within the South African context. Now, absolutely not, because as we said, and I've said this a couple of times already, the majority of the land, 80% of the farmland in South Africa belongs to the white minority, which is around 7%.

So how does Mr. Musk see that as racist is quite astonishing. These phrases show how strong Donald Trump and Elon Musk's feelings are towards South Africa. Where does all of that come from?

Well, again, I think there's a strong sense that Elon Musk has the ear of President Donald Trump. There seems to be a lot of influence there. It's something that the U.S. administration has never spoken about in the past. So it's intriguing now that you have the president of the United States saying things that

Mr. Musk has been putting out on social media, even during the last Trump administration. A lot of people in South Africa are going to be extremely worried about what Donald Trump is doing and says he will do as a result of these allegations that land is being confiscated. Now, just to be absolutely clear, the ANC, that is South Africa's governing party, has said that no land has been seized without compensation. But Trump's

already frozen foreign aid to South Africa and says he's going to freeze all future funding. What impact will that have on people there? Well, it's already having an impact within the South African context because South Africa is also a country that has one of the highest rates of HIV in the world.

And the USID has been a supplier, if you like, in terms of income to people getting antiretrovirals. There is a fear with access now. And if, for example, they're not able to access their medication, you could see a flare up of HIV within the South African context. And I think people are really worried about that. But bigger than that, Hannah, there is this massive demand.

trade issue that South Africa is worried about. And I think this is really important to actually speak about. South Africa shares currently a really good relationship with the United States when it comes to trade. And it's part of the African Growth and Opportunity Act, which is called AGOA. South Africa is part of that.

But this current situation puts it in a very, very fragile situation because the membership for AGOA will come to end around September of this year. And what the Trump administration could do is use pressure on the South African government to withdraw its membership, which then means that it doesn't have the same trade agreements, that it will be worse off, that the economy could collapse.

you know, suffer. So the finance minister has an issue on his hands here within the South African context to try and see how they're going to repair that. Because outside of US aid, which provides part of that economy, the bigger issue is what is South Africa's relationship like going to be with the United States in terms of its trade agreement? Economists have noted that the suspension of AGOA poses a serious economic risk for the South African economy.

What I found really interesting about this whole thing is how it fits in with everything else that Donald Trump is doing, because he's accusing South Africa of grabbing land. But at the same time, he's trying to take over Greenland, the Panama Canal and the Gaza Strip. Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, South Africans have been talking about that within the country as well. They said, you know, it's...

there's so much of a hypocrisy on that. You're coming to us to dictate to us about this law, which you perceive, which is not true in the way in which you have perceived it, but you are talking about the takeover of the Gulf of Mexico and, you know, other land that here's after example, Greenland, which you've already mentioned. It's become a huge talking point and a bit of a joke within the South African context. Connie, thank you so much for coming into the studio. You're welcome. Thank you for having me. Thank you.

And that is it for today's episode. Thank you so much for joining us. I'm Hannah Gelbart. You've been listening to What in the World from the BBC World Service. We'll be back with another episode soon. See you then.