John Matisonn: SA gets closer to Europe as US tensions persist

Key topics:Trump tensions push South Africa closer to EuropeSA shifts foreign policy toward consistency, human rightsStronger ties with France, Germany, Spain amid global reset.Sign up for your early morning brew of the BizNews Insider to keep you up to speed with the content that matters. The newsletter will land in your inbox every morning on weekdays. Register here.Support South Africa's bastion of independent journalism, offering balanced insights on investments, business, and the political economy, by joining BizNews Premium. Register here.If you prefer WhatsApp for updates, sign up to the BizNews channel here..By John Matisonn.Fallout from US President Donald Trump’s hostility to the South African government appears to be bringing South Africa closer to other western countries, especially in Europe.Reports that French President Emmanuelle Macron disinvited President Cyril Ramaphosa as a guest at the next G7 meeting because the Trump administration refused to attend if South Africa was there has been followed by a flurry of activity between South Africa and France.There has also been increased diplomatic contact with Germany, Spain and other European countries as France and other “middle powers” are trying to reshape relations with countries like South Africa in the wake of Trump’s actions in distancing himself from them too. .Read more:.Trump freezes US aid to South Africa as tension escalates.Trump clashed with his Nato allies over their low military budgets, his steep tariff demands, and their lukewarm responses to his call on European states to facilitate the US and Israel’s war in Iran.In this climate the International Relations and Cooperation Department, Dirco, has presented a sharpened policy to the cabinet and the GNU clearing house mechanism that begins to take account of some of the longstanding criticism of South Africa’s cozy relations with adversaries of western democracies like Iran.In his presentation, repeated at the Cape Town press club, Dirco Director-General Zane Dangor promised a more consistent foreign policy that is likely to improve ties with Europe.Dangor framed South Africa’s more consistent attitude to other countries with an admission that South Africa has been inconsistent about human rights and United Nations charter violations.“The challenge for us is to be more consistent,” Dangor said. “We’ve been accused of being inconsistent, and at points we have been inconsistent.” The shift is intended to criticize countries that violate the United Nations charter, whether they are “friends” of South Africa or not. In an apparent reference to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, he said that the government “did not always agree with the actions of its friends.”Dangor endorsed Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney’s characterisation of US policy as a permanent “rupture” of the post-World War II order, and his call for middle powers to come together. Dangor indicated South Africa sees itself in that camp and had met with Finland as early as 2023 with that in mind. South African diplomacy has become more engaged with other European democracies, including Germany, France, Spain and the United Kingdom.Ramaphosa and French President Emmanuelle Macron have developed a warm personal relationship which helped them navigate the G7 fallout, since Macron has consistently championed South Africa’s participation in the G20 against US objections. Ramaphosa’s appointment of Roelf Meyer as South Africa’s ambassador to the US should be seen in the context of this evolving policy after an array of personal and governmental slights.Meyer’s brief is to do all he can to help land the elusive South Africa-US trade deal. But his presence as ambassador is a signal that Ramaphosa’s relationship with white Afrikaners who implemented apartheid remains conciliatory.Once Meyer is ensconced in South Africa’s prestigiously placed Massachusetts Avenue embassy opposite Britain’s, Meyer will obviously be seen as a spokesman for white Afrikaners as much as anyone – including Elon Musk, Gary Player and Donald Trump.This explains the disappointment of Afrikaner groups that have lobbied Washington to take action against Tshwane for the treatment of white Afrikaners and farmers.At the press club event Dangor took significant flak from the honorary consul-general of Peru, South African Advocate Mark Novitz, who said his diplomatic colleagues have long found Dirco to be an obstacle to getting trade and other agreements done..Read more:.The Economist: Spain's power grid falters amid renewable surge.“A common complaint of ambassadors and consuls-general is that they realise they are going to get absolutely nowhere and sit out the remainder of their term,” Novitz told Dangor. “The reason is that whatever they try to do, Dirco is a stumbling block. In every instance the stumbling block is Dirco. 25 years a trade deal not materialized. We have been trying for eight years to get Peru tariffs down with a trade deal.” Dangor said he would meet with Novitz to try and make progress.

John Matisonn: SA gets closer to Europe as US tensions persist

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