Lamola Hits Back: Trump Is Granting Refugee Status To The 'privileged'

International Relations and Cooperation Minister Ronald Lamola has accused US President Donald Trump of granting refugee status to a group in South Africa that remains amongst the most economically privileged.

He was reacting to Trumps executive order issued on Friday 7 February that addressed South Africas alleged egregious actions .

In the order, Trump claims the recently signed Expropriation Act enables the government to seize ethnic minority Afrikaners' agricultural property without compensation.

This Act follows countless government policies designed to dismantle equal opportunity in employment, education and business, and hateful rhetoric and government actions fuelling disproportionate violence against racially disfavoured landowners, he claimed falsely.

In addition, South Africa has taken aggressive positions towards the United States and its allies, including accusing Israel, not Hamas, of genocide in the International Court of Justice, and reinvigorating its relations with Iran to develop commercial, military and nuclear arrangements.

Consequently, he cut off aid to South Africa. He also announced a policy to promote the resettlement of Afrikaner refugees escaping government-sponsored race-based discrimination, including racially discriminatory property confiscation.

In a statement on Saturday 8 February, Lamola said the orders foundational premise lacks factual accuracy and fails to recognise South Africa's profound and painful history of colonialism and apartheid.

We are concerned by what seems to be a campaign of misinformation and propaganda aimed at misrepresenting our great nation. It is disappointing to observe that such narratives seem to have found favour among decision-makers in the United States of America, he added.

It is ironic that the executive order makes provision for refugee status in the US for a group in South Africa that remains amongst the most economically privileged, while vulnerable people in the US from other parts of the world are being deported and denied asylum despite real hardship.

Lamola reiterated the governments commitment to finding diplomatic solutions to any misunderstandings or disputes.