South Africa
sil vly VC bros?
SEE APARTHEID afrikANER TRUMP
israel war crime ~ Bibi?
trump ambush fail; bulwark chill wht wine jacob zuma and other wacko min party; agr min wht ~ 30 yrs to ANC 525
afriforum // KKK term 1, tucker
amerikaaners npr 11? 25
rww --> Anna Maria Barry-Jester and Sharon Lerner @ ProPublica: Trump Officials Want to Use Human Rights Aid to Advocate for White South Africans and Right-Wing Causes in Europe
Proposed grant recipients have included a free-speech organization that has fought against bans on “gay conversion therapy” and an Afrikaner group that promotes self-governance.
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The ANC, EFF and a parliamentary committee have criticised US Ambassador Leo Bozell’s public comments, with calls growing for the government to consider declaring him persona non grata.© Kris Connor / Getty Images North America / AFP
As South Africa's relationship with the United States hits its lowest point since 1994, a growing chorus in Pretoria is making a pointed distinction: the problem is not America, it's Ambassador Leo Brent Bozell III.
The argument, now openly voiced by diplomats, analysts and politicians, is that Bozell — toxic, impolite and openly contemptuous in his public style — has made himself incapable of doing the core job of an ambassador: building a relationship. And that, his critics say, is why he should be replaced, not because South Africa wants to break with Washington. International relations expert Kingsley Makhubela told the SABC that Bozell is failing in his mission to rebuild relations.
"The basic function of an ambassador is to build relations between the two countries. So based on that, you can see that he's failing. And for anyone to say that these demarches are a usual procedural issue in the function of diplomatic missions, they are misleading the nation," Makhubela said. Makhubela's assessment follows an unprecedented run of diplomatic rebukes.
South Africa's Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) has summoned Bozell for a third formal démarche in nine months — a record for a US envoy in Pretoria.DIRCO accused him of "undiplomatic conduct", while Parliament's Portfolio Committee on International Relations noted that the United States "remains an important trade, investment and historical partner for South Africa" and that "constructive engagement requires mutual respect". The breaking point came after Bozell published an op-ed declaring diplomacy "useless" and saying Washington had "run out of patience" with Pretoria.
"I was taken aback. You can't have a diplomat who says time for talking is over. It's our job to talk. So, if you can't talk as a diplomat and you cannot dialogue… get out of the kitchen," International Relations Minister Ronald Lamola told the Newsnote. Lamola added: "Yes, he has been involved in very undiplomatic conduct. As a diplomat, you cannot interfere in the domestic politics of your host." Bozell responded on X, accusing Lamola of a personal insult: "So here we go again.
Another Minister Lamola personal insult aimed at an American leader (this time me) which, when denounced, will result in a demarche with a lecture about being 'undiplomatic.'"He later dismissed the three démarches as "kabuki theatre." Bozell's tenure has coincided with a rapid escalation: In September, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio announced targeted visa restrictions against South African officials accused of enabling uncompensated land seizures and race-based discrimination.
On November 2, Bozell announced South Africa's removal from AGOA from January 1, 2027, calling it "predictable and preventable" and blaming Pretoria for rejecting Washington's "Five Asks" on expropriation, B-BBEE, rural crime, Afrikaner refugees and the "Kill the Boer" chant.In interviews with Fox News Digital, Bozell accused President Cyril Ramaphosa of failing to condemn what he called incitement to kill: "You've got a president of South Africa who refuses to condemn an incitement to kill."
He has also said: "I am sorry, I don't care what your courts say, it's hate speech" — referring to a South African court ruling that the struggle song is not hate speech. Critics say that tone — lecturing, dismissing courts, and conducting policy via op-eds and Fox News — is the opposite of diplomacy. The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has gone furthest, calling for Bozell to be expelled and declared persona non grata. The party said Bozell has expressed contempt for the country, the President, the legislature and the judiciary, and has "taken it upon himself" to dictate South Africa's domestic and foreign policy. "Perhaps most disrespectfully as a diplomat, Bozell stated that he does not care what our courts say about the struggle song Kill The Boer, Kill The Farmer, and that our government must condemn what our courts correctly characterised as free speech," the EFF said.
What is striking about the current debate is what it is not: a call to cut ties with the United States. Even Bozell himself acknowledges the depth of the relationship, pointing to more than 500 US companies operating in South Africa — Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Visa — and billions in potential investment in mining and telecommunications.South African officials make the same point.
The dispute, they argue, is with an envoy who treats Pretoria as an ideological opponent to be coerced, not a partner to be negotiated with. Bozell, a veteran conservative activist with no prior foreign service experience and who had never lived in Africa before his appointment, was confirmed 53-43 on a party-line Senate vote in December 2025. Analyst Ofentse Donald Davhie warned at the time: "He is here to extract concessions, he is not here to make any new friends." For many in Pretoria, that prediction has now come true.
The message emerging from DIRCO, from Parliament and from analysts is consistent: South Africa still wants a working partnership with Washington — on trade, investment, security and AGOA. It just cannot build one with an ambassador who has declared dialogue useless. As one senior diplomat put it privately this week: "Replace Bozell, and the relationship can be repaired. Keep Bozell, and it will keep collapsing — not because America and South Africa cannot agree, but because he cannot talk." CAJ News
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BBC 9 26
South Africa-Trump row: US limits visas for officials over alleged anti-white discrimination
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roberts climate obstruct
- Networks of think tanks are spreading obstruction globally
A group of think tanks—public policy institutes that perform research and
advocacy—have promoted disinformation and misinformation about climate
science and contested climate policies via reports and presentations to leg-
islatures, news and social media, and other channels.49,50,51 They present
quasi-academic positions while shifting the framing of climate change from
a science-based issue to a matter of individual liberty and economic free-
dom (Chapter 5). They have also funded research reports and conferences to
challenge the IPCC consensus on anthropogenic climate change52 and have
networked transnationally to increase their capacity to promote or disrupt
specific political discourses on the topic.53 Their institutional structure is
shaped by the predominance of men, especially in the case of European think
tanks, illustrating a documented alignment between masculinity and climate
contrarianism.54 There is also a strong convergence between the far-right,
neoliberal thought advanced by these think tanks and resistance to climate
action (Chapter 5).55
Many of the most influential think tanks are based in the United States, but
the dominance of think tanks has spread globally, thanks in part to the Atlas
Network, a global network of such organizations that advocates free-market
(libertarian) and neoliberal policies (Chapter 5). The Heartland Institute in the
United States, the Free Market Foundation in South Africa, and the Global
Warming Policy Foundation in the United Kingdom all have worked to chal-
lenge climate policies and programs (Chapter 5). Similar ideas and practices
have also spread to think tanks in the Global South, such as Andes Libre in Peru
and the Instituto Liberdade in Brazil (Chapter 8). Funding flows around the
world to support these think tanks, which share information, tactics, events,
connections, experts, board memberships, and legal support.56...
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AN 5 25
South Africans are wearily attuned to governments’ Orwellian misuse of language. After all, South Africa is a country where a one-time government passed a law (the Natives Abolition of Passes and Coordination of Documents Act of 1952) which extended rather than abolishing the notorious pass system. This made it compulsory for black South Africans over the age of 16 to carry a passbook. And the same government passed the Extension of University Education Act of 1959 which made it more, not less, difficult for black students to register at “open” (or white) universities.
So perhaps they should not be unduly surprised that the government of the US has imported 49 Afrikaners and labelled them as “refugees”. The claim is that they are escaping from the persecution of Afrikaners – and white people more broadly – in South Africa today.
The Trump administration knows perfectly well this claim is a complete fabrication. As President Cyril Ramaphosa and his government have pointed out, there is no evidence whatsoever that Afrikaners or white people more generally are subject to genocide.
True, South Africa has one of the highest murder rates in the world. But it is poor black South Africans – not whites – who are principal victims of such deadly violence. Nor are Afrikaners/whites subject to persecution. Along with all other South Africans, their human rights are protected by a constitution. This is no mere piece of paper. Its provisions are (albeit imperfectly, and unlike in the US these days) largely enforced by the courts.
Furthermore, genocide implies the deliberate elimination of a people on racial, ethnic, or religious grounds. Therefore, if a genocide of whites and Afrikaners was taking place, we might assume that their numbers would be falling. In fact the reverse is true. The white population has continued to grow (albeit slowly) in absolute numbers since 1994.
Worse, the characterisation of Afrikaners as refugees at a moment in time when the people of Gaza are daily subject to a regime of death, terror, and murder inflicted on them by the Israeli government is not merely an absurdity but a downright insult to those genuinely subject to genocide.
So, what is really going on?
The drivers
Extensive commentary has correctly highlighted the motivations of the Trump administration.
First, the administration has launched an attack on what it terms the “tyranny” of “diversity, equity and inclusion” policies across the entire spectrum of public and private institutions in America. Critics argue this is driven by an appeal to Trump’s white Christian nationalist political base. Because post-apartheid South Africa, rightly or wrongly, has become the poster-country of diversity, equity and inclusion policies internationally, because of its constitutional commitment to non-racialism and diversity, it has been singled out for attack.
Secondly, labelling Afrikaners as refugees plays to the insecurities of Trump’s political base. This finds the idea of a white minority being ruled by a black majority government difficult to swallow.
Third, characterising Afrikaners as subject to genocide is a very deliberate response to South Africa’s charging of Israel as guilty of genocide against the Palestinian people before the International Court of Justice. But this is unacceptable to the US Christian nationalist right. For them the existence of Israel represents the realisation of Biblical truth – the return of Jews to the Holy Land.
Trump is saying that the US can and will play the same game, using it to clobber South Africa regardless of the groundlessness of the charge. But, being Trump, he will balance pandering to his support base against what economic benefits he can extract from South Africa.
The landscape
But what of the 49 Afrikaners themselves? Why have they chosen to accept the opportunity offered to them by the US government? After all, extensive attention in the South African media has been given to Afrikaners who have defiantly stated that. VID]
The reasons they give are that it’s their home. And they fully accept that, at least formally, South Africa has become a non-racial democracy.
Likewise, as I have detailed in my book on Whites and Democracy in South Africa, Afrikaners and whites have not only survived in democratic South Africa but, generally, have prospered economically. Furthermore, whites as a “population group” (to use outdated apartheid-era terminology) have participated fully in South African democracy. They are more highly disposed to voting in elections than other racial groupings, and de facto, they are well represented in parliament and local government by the Democratic Alliance, which is a vigorous defender of their interests.
But (there is always a but), if we want to guess the motivations of Trump’s 49 “refugees”, we need to bear in mind the following.
First, until we know more about the personal circumstances of the individuals involved, we cannot really know what has driven them to take the drastic step of leaving families and their personal history behind by moving to America.
Second, most whites have responded to the arrival of democracy pragmatically. They have their numerous complaints, notably about equity employment (affirmative action policies in favour of blacks) which they view as discriminatory against whites. But they have continued to enjoy high rates of employment. Indeed they continue to occupy the higher ranks of employment in the private sector in disproportionate numbers.
However, although many whites continue to live in a de facto overwhelmingly white world, both at work and at their homes in suburbia, there remains a minority which has remained wholly unreconciled to the changes which have taken place politically and economically since 1994. The armed opposers linked to the far-right have long been defeated. But we may presume the 49 belong to a broader category of passive resisters who have withdrawn into a white world as much as possible.
Third, although most whites continue to do well economically, the changes which have taken place since 1994 have led to the re-appearance of a small class of largely uneducated poor whites who feel excluded from employment by equity employment legislation. And who generally feel the loss of their racial status under democracy.
Opportunists, not refugees
Having said all that, some interesting questions remain.
Presumably the Afrikaner 49 belonged to that category of whites which, for one reason or another, is disposed to leave South Africa. However, emigrating requires jumping through numerous hoops; meeting educational and professional qualifications, getting a job offer, having sufficient financial resources to take with them to support themselves and their families before they can qualify for recipient countries’ social security systems, and so on. Apart from the emotional costs involved, emigration is not always the easiest of options, even for those who wish to “escape”.
The evidence suggests that the heads of household among the Afrikaner 49 are drawn not only from that minority of Afrikaners who are totally unreconciled to democracy, but who – quite simply – are opportunists who have availed themselves of a short cut to emigrate.
Roger Southall, Professor of Sociology, *University of the Witwatersrand
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
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an 5 25
MAGA is furious at the Episcopal Church for refusing a directive from the federal government to help resettle white South Africans granted refugee status.
Newsweek reports the church submitted its refusal days after almost 50 South Africans arrived at a U.S. airport under a fast-tracked refugee program that appears to only serve white south Afrikaners. Other groups, including Black Sudanese refugees fleeing religious violence — who are also from Africa — are not similarly fast-tracked.
The new arrivals are minority descendants of mainly Dutch and French colonial settlers who created the segregationist system of apartheid in 1948, which allows white people to legally steal land and resources from the majority Black population, who were relocated to segregated overcrowded, townships of lean-tos and shacks.
READ MORE: Top Senate Republican issues Trump an ultimatum
Data show 73 percent of privately owned land in South Africa is white-owned despite white people comprising only 7 percent of the population. In corporate South Africa, white individuals also occupy 62 percent of top management positions while 17 percent of leadership roles are held by Black managers.
Critics say Trump’s decision to expedite resettlement of Afrikaners bypasses an onerous refugee system that leaves thousands from conflict zones stuck in a years-long vetting processes and dangerous conditions.
Rev. Sean W. Rowe, presiding bishop of the Episcopal Church, confirmed in a letter to church members that the government contacted the church and expected it to resettle some of the South Africans under terms of a grant. But Rowe said the request posed a moral dilemma for the Episcopal Church, which has deep ties to the Anglican Church of Southern Africa and counts the late Archbishop Desmond Tutu — an outspoken apartheid opponent — among its spiritual forebears.
"In light of our church's steadfast commitment to racial justice and reconciliation and our historic ties with the Anglican Church of Southern Africa, we are not able to take this step," Rowe wrote. “… Accordingly, we have determined that, by the end of the federal fiscal year, we will conclude our refugee resettlement grant agreements with the U.S. federal government."
READ MORE:'Embarrassment:' Trump admin asks judge to hide it's tactics for mass layoffs
Right-wing figures roasted the Episcopal Church, with conservative political activist Charlie Kirk posting on X: "I guess you aren't a refugee if you are white. According to the Episcopal Church Jesus doesn't love white people."
Conservative commentator Alex Jones, a conspiracy theorist who settled a lawsuit with families of Sandy Hook victims after calling the mass shooting a “hoax”, wrote: "All Federal Funds MUST Be Pulled From The Episcopal Church. It's Time To Enforce The Separation Of Church And State."
Read the full Newsweek report here.
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Trump tweeted on Wednesday night that the South African government was "seizing land" from white farmers, who he claimed to be the subject of large-scale killings.
This claim is false — there is no evidence of large-scale targeted killings of white farmers anywhere in South Africa.
The Anti-Defamation League released a blistering statement about Trump's comments, which he appears to have tweeted after watching a conspiratorial Fox News segment.
"It is extremely disturbing that the President of the United States echoed a longstanding and false white supremacist claim that South Africa’s white farmers are targets of large-scale, racially-motivated killings by South Africa’s black majority," the group said.
The ADL explained how Trump's claims are actually part of a long-standing effort by white supremacists to falsely paint white people as victims of genocide.
White supremacists in the United States have made such claims for years. In early 2012, ADL’s Center on Extremism documented how white supremacists in the United States were gearing up for protests as part of something they termed the “South Africa Project (SAP).” The goal of the organizers, which included representatives from major neo-Nazi, racist skinhead, "traditional white supremacist," Christian Identity groups, as well as racist prison gangs, was to stop the alleged ‘genocide of Whites’ in South Africa. The protests originated in 2011 at the hands of Monica Stone, a long-time member of the Louisiana-based white supremacist Christian Defense League and immigrant from South Africa.
Prominent American white supremacist Richard Spencer has used the South Africa talking point as recently as this March.
The ADL ended with a damning indictment of Trump's racist remarks.
"We would hope that the President would try to understand the facts and realities of the situation in South Africa, rather than repeat disturbing, racially divisive talking points used most frequently by white supremacists," the ADL concluded.
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http://grist.org/news/spy-agencies-are-snooping-on-enviros-around-the-globe/
stratfor/mongoven BS on ken saro-wiwa
This article was first published as "Race-baiting Strategy Helps Keep Shell Pumping in Nigeria"in PR Watch, Volume 3, No. 2, Second Quarter 1996. It original article was authored by John Stauber and Sheldon Rampton and is used here with permission. As with all SourceWatch articles, feel free to edit and revise.
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Shell Oil and Nigeria's military dictatorship are using a black-against-black "divide and confuse" PR strategy to deflect criticism following Nigeria's executions of writer Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other environmental and human rights activists.
Their approach resembles the "Neptune Strategy" developed a decade ago by Jack Mongoven's former PR firm to defend Shell's dealings in South Africa.
Following the hanging of Saro-Wiwa in November of last year, Shell and Nigeria each launched separate massive PR campaigns claiming that they are participating in a "transition to democracy" in Nigeria.
Nigeria's $10.7 million campaign employed eight U.S. PR firms whose work included production of a 297-page book and a three-part TV documentary, plus advertisements targeting Washington policymakers. The regime funded a "fact-finding" junket of black journalists who visited Nigeria and reported back with accolades for Nigeria's ruler, General Sani Abacha. Abacha's government also bought glossy, multi-page color insert ads in black newspapers, claiming that criticisms of Nigeria are racist, "double standard treatment of Black African Nations by the United States government. If Jewish Americans can stand up for Israel we can stand up for Africa."
These efforts to enlist black support for a dictatorship that oppresses blacks are reminiscent of the 1987 "Neptune Strategy" used to counter a boycott against Shell's business dealings in apartheid South Africa.
The Neptune Strategy was developed by Pagan International, whose partners included Jack Mongoven, Alvin Biscoe and Ronald Duchin. Pagan International organized and subsidized a group composed of black clergy called the Coalition on Southern Africa (COSA), which countered calls for Shell to divest its South African holdings by talking instead of ambitious plans to promote education and training of South African blacks and develop black-black business links between South Africa and the United States. In reality, COSA was a deceptive paper front group with no resources to carry out these goals.
[
Pagan International is a now-defunct public relations firm founded by Rafael Pagan. Several of its principal executives went on to form a separate firm, called Mongoven, Biscoe & Duchin.
Pagan International is a different firm than Pagan Communications.]