Worldview: Trump's rage at South Africa’s land reform - race or geopolitics?

Key topics:SA’s land expropriation law sparks US aid freeze.Trump, Musk accuse Pretoria of anti-white discrimination.Reform aims to redress apartheid legacy without collapse..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 at 5:30am 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 Kerry Lanaghan.South Africa's new land expropriation law - permitting property seizure without compensation in specific cases - has reignited deep tensions domestically and triggered a sharp backlash from US President Donald Trump. The move, meant to accelerate land reform for black South Africans dispossessed under apartheid, has sparked fears over private property rights, foreign investment, and diplomatic fallout with major trade partners.The legislation comes after years of slow progress on redistribution targets set post-apartheid. Communities like Bernard Shabangu's in Mpumalanga have pursued collaborative land reform by working with existing white farmers, creating jobs and driving successful exports like lychees. Yet, widespread frustrations remain, and President Cyril Ramaphosa's government has faced mounting pressure to fast-track restitution efforts.Critics, including Afrikaner farmers like Lion du Plessis, argue that the bill undermines property rights and access to credit, essential for agricultural sustainability. AfriForum, a conservative civil rights group, warns of investor flight, citing uncertainty and potential government overreach. However, land reform advocates say the bill includes constitutional safeguards and is vital for addressing historic inequalities in land ownership that remain essentially unchanged since apartheid.Trump's reaction has been particularly forceful. In an executive order, he described the bill as anti-white discrimination and halted US aid to South Africa. He linked the law to a broader pattern of "hateful rhetoric". He accused Pretoria of aligning with US adversaries like Iran and Hamas, citing South Africa's genocide accusation against Israel at the International Court of Justice. Trump even offered to resettle "Afrikaner refugees," inflaming rhetoric and suggesting ideological motives behind his administration's stance.Further complicating matters, Elon Musk - now part of Trump's government - criticised South Africa's Black Economic Empowerment (BEE) laws as racist after facing regulatory hurdles for Starlink's rollout in the country. Musk's criticism and Trump's threats to end trade preferences under the African Growth and Opportunity Act (AGOA) have raised alarm about South Africa's future access to US markets.Yet ironically, trade sanctions could disproportionately hurt white commercial farmers, the very group Trump claims to defend. Professor Ruth Hall points out that South Africa's land reform aims to correct settler-colonial injustices without destabilising the economy. She and land lawyer Bulelwa Mabasa stress that expropriation is tightly regulated under the new law.President Ramaphosa, facing domestic pressures and coalition politics, insists the law is a democratic necessity, not a "vulgar land grab." He vows South Africa won't be bullied and plans to dispatch diplomatic envoys to clarify the country's positions on land, Israel, and broader foreign policy.At its core, the conflict is about more than land. It reflects South Africa's precarious balancing act between historical redress and economic pragmatism amid a polarising global landscape where race, geopolitics, and identity intersect.(This article is a précis of a piece originally published in BBC and can be read in full here.)