South African Catholics reject Trump’s white genocide claims

South Africa’s past systems of government meant that, despite making up 85 per cent of the population, Black people only had access to 12 per cent of the land.

The government of South Africa has engaged in affirmative action, which aims to bridge the gap between Black and white South Africans. In January, President Cyril Ramaphosa signed a bill intended to address the land dispossession. Under the bill, land appropriation is possible.

US President Donald Trump recently claimed that “genocide” was taking place in South Africa. He said white farmers were being “brutally killed” and their “land is being confiscated”. Recently, a group of 59 white South Africans arrived in the US as refugees.

Johan Viljoen, director of the Denis Hurley Peace Institute of the South African Bishops’ Conference, dismissed President Trump’s claim as baseless, telling Crux that there is “absolutely no evidence” to support allegations of genocide against whites or Afrikaans people in South Africa.

Viljoen, himself an Afrikaner, argued that such statements reflect President Trump’s fundamental misunderstanding – either of the concept of genocide or of South Africa’s complex 400-year history. He said that even with the expropriation act, the government has not expropriated any land at all.

“Not a single white farm has been expropriated to date. It has all been done on a willing buyer, willing seller principle,” he told Crux.

Chris Chatteris of the Jesuit institute of Southern Africa told Crux that most Afrikaners “are doing just fine”. He said that some feel insecure, as many minorities do in many places.

FULL STORY

South African Catholic leaders refute U.S. claims of white genocide (By Ngala Killian Chimtom/Crux)