John Steenhuisen, leader of the Democratic Alliance, an opposition party that entered a governing coalition with the ruling African National Congress (ANC), says Afrikaner refugees made a “mistake” by leaving.
A charter flight of 49 Afrikaner refugees arrived in the U.S. last week, the first of some 70,000 who have applied, citing racial discrimination and the threat of expropriation.
South Africa’s Sunday Times reported Steenhuisen’s remarks, which were made at a farming convention:
“We can’t determine where people live and what their life choices are. I think they’ve made a mistake,” he said.
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Steenhuisen said South Africa is not experiencing genocide or land expropriation without compensation. “There’s no single farm that’s being expropriated without compensation,” he said.
“Yes, we have issues with crime, but these affect all citizens in the same way. What we need to do when important trading partners like the US are making decisions is ensure they are making it based on facts, not fiction.”
Steenhuisen, who will be part of President Cyril Ramaphosa’s five-member delegation to the U.S. this week, serves as Minister of Agriculture in the Cabinet.
In his remarks, he repeated the government line that the Trump administration’s differences with South Africa are due to “misinformation,” rather than because of South Africa’s policies, foreign and domestic.
Steeinhuisen has been a severe critic of President Donald Trump in the past.
He described the upcoming visit between Ramaphosa and Trump as “a good opportunity for Ramaphosa to meet these counterparts to dispel some of the myths and disinformation that have been whispered in his ear about South Africa,” the Times reported, rather than an opportunity for change.
He is the only Democratic Alliance member of the five-person delegation, which includes ministers Ronald Lamola, Khumbudzo Ntshavheni, and Parks Tau — all members of the ANC, like Ramaphosa.
Critics have said that Steenhuisen and the Democratic Alliance have moved too close to the ANC on several issues, and have failed, despite some opposition, to deter it from destructive policies such as the Expropriation Act, which allows the government to seize property without compensation. (The law was signed earlier this year by Ramaphosa, and the Democratic Alliance is challenging it in court, irritating the ANC.)
However, the DA successfully opposed a proposed budget that raised the value-added tax (VAT) by 2%.
Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of Trump 2.0: The Most Dramatic ‘First 100 Days’ in Presidential History, available for Amazon Kindle. He is also the author of The Trumpian Virtues: The Lessons and Legacy of Donald Trump’s Presidency, now available on Audible. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.
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