Rebuked by Donald Trump but praised in South Africa

The president of South Africa, Cyril Ramaphosa, and his delegation went to Washington this week hoping for a boost and a reset after months of acrimony with the Donald Trump administration.

Instead, they obtained brutal diplomacy and high issues, dotted with insults and played millions around the world in real time. It was like a painful job review made by a boss on a noisy noisy.

Praised by many to remain composed and reconciliative in front of an exerted Trump, while also being criticized by some for not having responded with more force to the accusations of Tump, reality awaits Ramaphosa in South Africa where he and his African National Congress (ANC) are faced with multiple pressures on several fronts.

The ANC was in a worried coalition – or government of national unity (GNU) – with 10 other parties for almost a year, forced to share power after lamentable results in the national elections.

There have been public battles between the parties inside and outside the coalition in relation to the controversial legislation of land and health care and tries to grow a budget in Parliament which would increase the most vulnerable taxes. It almost saw the end of the coalition earlier this year.

The economy stagnates, crime rates are extent to heaven, as is corruption and unemployment, public services are largely dysfunctional and infrastructure is collapsing. There also seems to be very little responsibility for those who break the law.

This has meant uncomfortable and intense questions about Ramaphosa’s policies by various political parties, as well as civil society.

Meanwhile, the ancient is unstable, while the opposite factions are starting to embark on the position before a crucial elective conference in 2027 which is likely to see a new party leader emerge.

At the same time, the noisiest criticisms of Ramaphosa, such as the chief of the Freedom Fighters (EFF), Julius Malema – who were in good place in the discredited file of Trump of “evidence” that the genocide was committed against white Afrikaners in South Africa – as well as former president Jacob Zuma, are even more emeupable.

Ramaphosa was therefore looking for a trade agreement, which desperately needs the company and the stability that it would bring to South Africa to stimulate real and lasting economic growth and put people back to work.

Ramaphosa said on Wednesday in Trump on Wednesday – that American investment was necessary to help fight unemployment which was a key factor in the high crime rate in the country.

The risk that the The trade on trade with the United States May not be renewed later this year due to the vision of the isolated world of Trump made it all the more urgent. This has given outdoor access to South Africa to the American market for certain goods and is credited with having stimulated the fragile economy of South Africa.

But the discourse on trade was overshadowed by the ambush of Trump’s oval offices for discredited allegations according to which white South Africans were persecuted.

However, there may still be a silver lining for Ramaphosa, and by extension his party, at least at the national level.

Yes, the list of tasks is incredibly long, and yes the pressure so that the South African president holds a coalition and the party together which is disorderly and deeply uncomfortable will await him on his return. And yes, the ANC has been in the weakest position since coming to power 30 years ago. But he is always in power, even if he shares it.

Above all, Ramaphosa’s conduct with Trump reminded South Africans to diplomatic pedigree and its importance for the order based on the rules of the country.

He is, with Nelson Mandela, the largest manufacturer and facilitator in South Africa of all time. It was at the nervous center to negotiate the end of the racist apartheid system in the early 1990s, and to keep South Africa together when many had prophesied its fatal fracture. He remained calm, smiled and has already faced much more bitter opponents.

More recently, he directed the country of the dark “State capture” Years of the Zuma administration, then by the locking of difficult codings. And also kept the ANC on his feet – just – when he hampered the house after the 2024 elections. He then took an old one injured in coalition policy and survived as president despite the opposition of his own party.

“I believe that if an Snap survey was done today, we would see his personal notes increase,” explains the South African editor and founder of explanation.co.za Verashni Pillay.

“He excels in these high pressure situations. He has this wealth of negotiation experience in environments probably much more tense where there was real blood in the streets and an imminent civil war. That is why you saw him particularly relaxed. It is masterful to spread tension at key moments.”

The surveys have constantly referenced the Ramaphosa effect – the most recent From the Social Research Foundation last month, which suggests that without him, ancient would support him even more the hemorrhage than she has already done, despite an equally coherent criticism of the South African president that he is too slow and undecided to solve the biggest problems in the country. To a large extent, this is always the case.

But this week’s events wanted to ostensibly intimidate, ridicule and embarrass Ramaphosa in the world, reminded many South Africans to what it brings to the government and to the country – a constant, stable and predictable center.

“I think what happened in the oval office reinforced the idea of” if not Ramaphosa then? “”, Said Pillay.

In fact, some believe that what the South Africans have seen at the White House will really strengthen the GNU-supported as it is by large companies, which will ultimately reassure the South Africans who looked at the drama.

“Reunion has shown a UNIFR-South Africa front, a public-private performance that the country has been promoting for more than a decade. This for the GNU is a great political theater which is reflected in political capital,” explains Itmeng Makgetla, political analyst at the University of Pretoria.

And indeed, the optics were all there. Ramaphosa facilitated a passionate refutation of the worst of Trump’s disinformation through the interventions of his partner in the leader of the Democratic Alliance (DA), John Steenhuisen – and one of the richest people in South Africa, Johann Rupert – Both of South African white people. If Trump understood the power of performance, Ramaphosa too.

“I think the GNU comes out of this fairly strong appearance,” explains Pillay. “The GNU occurred at a very good time for South Africa before this crisis. If it was just the Government of the ANC in the room, [Ramaphosa’s arguments] would not have landed. But being able to say that we have these parties which represent the whites in the government is such a strong declaration. “”

So, what does all this mean for those who on the extreme flanks of South African policy and discourse?

After the lights were sized, Julius Malema has been shown by Trump singing a song which says that some call the murder of white farmers, although a court judged that it was only political rhetoric. Could it collect the interior political capital to be put under the world projectors?

Yes, say a few. “For those of the country who are quite tired of the diatribe of President Trump and the United States … This will probably strengthen Malema [and] Parties like the MK because it will essentially say: “Look, we can surely lean back for these individuals and these lies”, said South African political analyst, Professor Kagiso “TK” Pooe from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg.

But Pillay does not agree.

“This will not result in political power for Malema. Most of its main leaders have already Defended at Jacob Zuma’s MK Party. Things for the efficient did not go well, even Wednesday. Julius Malema’s policy mark, to want everything to burn, to blame whites for everything … is entertaining, but he did not win votes because most South Africans do not want their country to be burned. “”

That said, there is a group of South Africans who want a faster and more radical change – the results of the MK party elections, a faction of anci escape, shows it.

And what about Afriforum – the Afrikaner interest group which shot the ears of Trump supporters for a number of years by lobbying and distributing right propaganda, in the hope of being heard?

Trump’s discredited audiovisual presentation of what he said is the systematic extermination of Afrikaner White farmers was the high -level brand of their lobbying efforts, amplified as they were in the oval office.

However, despite extraordinarily high levels of violent crimes in South Africa, many are angry with the group. “In a way, I think that many South Africans – even those who do not support the ANC – can finally see that there are some people who are not for South Africa. These people have been distinguished and it is positive in a certain way,” explains Professor Pooe.

“We know that a large number of Afrikaan speakers are people of color,” said Pillay. “Afriforum brought the cause of Afrikaners in South Africa by racializing it.”

Kallie Kriel of Afriforum defended the driving of the group on a local television channel, Newzroom Afrika: “It was not Afriforum singing the genocidal calls so that someone was killed. If President Ramaphosa had not gone there to tell the Americans that they do not know what is happening, they will see it as an innsultary because they are embarrassed in South Africa and intelligence, “he said.

As the dust settles the drama on Wednesday, Ramaphosa looks and calculates. It has always been at the center of the main inflection points in South African history when a kind of rupture occurred and the country had to change the course considerably. He reads these moments so well.

Wednesday’s upheavals at Trump’s White House may not have been economic and diplomatic reset with the United States that was hoped for, but could still mark a dramatic reset for Ramaphosa and the GNU with the South African public.

Additional Khanyisile Ngcobo reports in Johannesburg