US-SA diplomatic tension: The likely regional ramifications
Lewanika Timothy | Monday February 26, 2024 10:14
South Africa can be metaphorically depicted as one of Africa’s fattened economies, a nation that has phoenixed from the ashes of apartheid and risen to become a continental giant.
The roly-poly nature of South Africa’s chunky economy comes at the backdrop of being a present figure at the dinner table of superpowers for the past decades, which have lucratively allowed the nation to enjoy foreign direct investment from both the East and the West allowing the nation to shine bright on Africa’s firmament.
For nations like Botswana, which feed off from South Africa’s backyard garden, it will be a development to watch with keen interest as South Africa’s economic challenges could have a speedy spillover effect on Botswana’s economy. Those lettered in politics often refer to it as a game and it will be an interesting ploy to watch as the world continues to fall in the crack between the East and the West.
Last week, a group of US policymakers in Washington bellowed strong objections against South Africa’s one-leg-in, one-leg-out tactics in international relations accusing the latter of “undermining US national security” in a bipartisan Bill that was presented to congress this week.
The Bill is a dossier seeking to review South Africa’s trade relations with the US following the former’s darling relationship with America’s rivals, Russia and China.
“The actions of the African National Congress (ANC), which since 1994 has held a governing majority and controlled South Africa’s executive branch, are inconsistent with its publicly stated policy of non-alignment in international affairs,” the bill read.
“In contrast to its stated stance of non-alignment, the South African government has a history of siding with malign actors, including Hamas, a US-designated foreign terrorist organisation and a proxy of the Iranian regime, and continues to pursue closer ties with the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and the Russian Federation,” the bill reads.
Notably, there has been a surge in anti-US and anti-West rhetoric in the ANC and sometimes in parts of South Africa’s government since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine last year, despite South Africa’s claimed neutral stance on the war.
The growing voice of South Africa’s sentiments has surely been disturbing for the US and other Western partners of South Africa because of its status as an influential democracy in the developing world, and as Africa’s most developed economy.
The nuances of South Africa’s position can be traced back to the historical roots between the old Soviet Union’s military and political support for the ANC when it was a liberation movement fighting to end the racist apartheid regime that oppressed the country’s black majority.
The West appears concerned that the ANC’s old ideological ties to Russia are now pulling South Africa into Moscow’s political orbit amid burgeoning global tensions. There are also growing economic ties between Africa, a continent of 1.3 billion people, and China. It is clear that the US is tired of turning a blind eye to South Africa’s bromance with Russia and China and that it wants South Africa out of its dinner table. The recent proclamation by Washington has surely sent shockwaves to Pretoria, which has been playing with fire for quite sometime now, rubbing shoulders with known enemies of the US while claiming a non-alignment foreign policy stance. In international relations, nations are guided by a foreign policy stance, which typically serves as a diplomatic roadmap of how a country relates to the rest of the world.
South Africa, like many countries in Africa, has taken a neutral position of non-alignment in diplomacy, which is an all-friends, no-enemies approach to international relations.
The can of worms started to slowly open in 2022 when the South African government came under fire for declining to release cargo documents relating to the visit of a Russian ship that the US alleged to be collecting a consignment of weapons for Moscow.
The ship popularly known as Lady R was mysteriously discovered by intelligence units in Cape Town, with intelligence units claiming that the ship was in South Africa to collect weapons to aid Russia in its war against Ukraine. The situation was so gloomy that the US ambassador to South Africa publicly accused the South African government of betraying the US and labelled the country an arms supplier aiding crimes against humanity in Ukraine.
Last year in an interview with the BBC, the ANC secretary-general, Fikile Mbalula, expressed friendly sentiments amid heightened desires to arrest President Vladimir Putin in South Africa by the West, stating that if Putin landed on South African shores, they wouldn’t allow any other nations to arrest him on their soils. An anti-West statement that many political analysts deemed to be a shot at the ANC’s feet by the secretary-general.
“If it was according to the ANC, we would want President Putin to be here, even tomorrow, to come to our country,” Mbalula said in the interview.
The chickens have surely come home to roost for the South African government, but it’s no secret that any dispute that arises in the global sphere has a root in the West vs East splinter. The world is divided between the US and its allies with the other half consisting of other global power contenders such as China and Russia. To deal with defiant South Africa, the US has many disciplining tools at its disposal. As it stands, the sanctions will not be the typical sanctions that were rained down on Zimbabwe after its fallout with the United Kingdom (UK) in the wake of its independence.
The first sanction measure could be to deny South African exports eased access into American territory. The US is South Africa’s second largest trading partner with most of its mineral exports destined for American shores. The restriction of eased access into the Us market is an easily achievable measure through denying South Africa a share of the African Growth and Opportunities Act (AGOA) trade benefits.
AGOA is a trade arrangement between the US and more than 30 sub-Saharan African countries, including South Africa. The agreement was established in 2000 and provides relaxed access to the US market for participating African states. Since its launch, South Africa has been a star performer in AGOA, benefiting more than most African countries with a surge in exports to the US under the Act.
In 2020 when the act came into use, South Africa increased its automotive exports to the US from $195 million in 2000 to $1.8 billion in 2013. In 2000, South Africa exported a total of $2.2 billion in automotive exports and 8.7% of it went to the US.
Taking this pie away from South Africa could be the best way to signal the West’s strong opinions against South Africa’s darling relationship with the West. The goal of the US is not to shut down South Africa’s economy but to signal warnings over its continuous steps close to Russia and China.
Analysts have also argued that a loss of AGOA could have ramifications for the US. The US relies on South Africa for a range of critical minerals. In 2021, the US imported nearly 100% of its chromium from South Africa as well as over 25% of its manganese, titanium, and platinum. Leveraging AGOA as a form of economic diplomacy is key for encouraging the security of critical mineral supplies.