Like two Ankole bulls in the White House China Room

As the guard of honour awaited the arrival of President Cyril Ramaphosa, one of the flag bearers fainted on the White House lawns. He wouldn’t be the only one carried from the White House that day.

United States President Donald Trump’s public schedule showed Ramaphosa arriving at 11:30. When Ramaphosa arrived 40 minutes late, it was clear that things were starting to go awry.

Mcebisi Jonas, South Africa’s special envoy to the US, whom the Presidency had announced as a member of the delegation, wasn’t in the US, but in London. Presumedly the Americans had either denied him entry to the US, Oval Office, or threatened him with consequences over MTN’s pending court case concerning the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and other terrorists in the Middle East.

Ramaphosa arrived with a full charm offensive, a well-crafted, fawning embrace of Trump, lavishing him with a 14kg book of South African golf courses and a collection of almost every South African Trump had ever played golf with.

In a jarring dig, Ramaphosa apologised to Trump for not gifting him a plane, and Trump countered that he would have accepted it. It was a light moment filled with passive-aggressive naiveté. Trump informed the press corps that Ramaphosa had phoned him, and that he had no idea where Ramaphosa had got his number. Ramaphosa had gate crashed Trump’s White House, and in the theatre of American politics, Trump was about to put on a show.

Absent from the meeting was one key person who we would have expected for the visit of a foreign president – Marco Rubio, US secretary of state. His absence was a clear indication of what wouldn’t be on the agenda: foreign policy.

Trump was laser focused. He didn’t want to talk about trade or tariffs; he didn’t want to talk about Qatari jets; and he didn’t want to talk about South Africa’s deviant foreign policy. Trump’s agenda was “white genocide”, the deliberate and intentional killing of white farmers in South Africa.

A total of 2 297 people have died in farm attacks since 1990 in South Africa, of whom 1 363 were white. Is this genocide, or merely rampant uncontrolled crime, a point made eloquently by Democratic Alliance leader and Agriculture Minister John Steenhuisen. Having bastardised the term “genocide” by taking Israel to the International Court of Justice, South Africa was in no position to discuss the semantics of international law.

Farm attacks undermine the very stability of the state, and jeopardise the nation’s food security. The government’s lack of concern makes Afrikaners feel unwelcome and fearful in their own land.

When Trump instructed the lights to be dimmed and the videos of “Kill the Boer, kill the farmer” incendiary chants to be played, a clear line could be drawn between politicians inciting genocidal murder and white farm deaths themselves.

While most of the video highlighted the outrageous rhetoric of Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema, included in the reel was former President Jacob Zuma singing the exact same song, clad in Ramaphosa’s African National Congress (ANC) regalia behind an ANC podium.

The South African delegation looked shellshocked. Ramaphosa squirmed and fidgeted in his chair, feigning ignorance of the Witkruis Monument and protests about the murder of white farmers.

Parks Tau, the minister of trade and industry, looked straight ahead, while Minister in the Presidency Khumbudzo Ntshavheni smirked. Ronald Lamola, the minister of international relations and cooperation, starred pensively at the screen as if waiting for his own performance to begin. It was Lamola himself who had said, “I am just giving a warning to white South Africans: they must voluntarily bring back the land … we can no longer be able to guarantee the continued safety of Mr Van der Merwe.

“The land question will not be won through romantic acts. We need to an act [sic] as forceful as a war to bring back the land to the majority of South Africans … we must never suffer under the illusion that now its [sic] democracy, we will be able to reclaim the land through peaceful means, through peaceful acts.”

The team appeared completely unprepared in the event things didn’t go according to Ramaphosa’s plan. Steenhuisen was clearly brought along as the token “whitey” with a talking part, while the golfers were there to be seen but not heard.

Ramaphosa had suggested to Trump that he listen to ordinary South Africans, so Trump decided to question the golfers and industrialist Dr Johann Rupert. That’s when things derailed further. Ernie Els told Trump, “Two wrongs don’t make a right,” presumably referring to apartheid and the killing of white farmers. He also appeared to thank the Americans for assisting the apartheid government to fight the ANC, Cubans, and Russians in Angola in the 1980s. It was incoherent, although he did say to Trump, “It’s very important for us to have your support and … get the change we need.”

Retief Goosen apparently wasn’t briefed to follow the Ramaphosa hymn sheet. He explained that he had grown up in Polokwane, his father was a farmer, “some of his buddy farmers got killed, the farm is still going, my brothers run it, but it’s a constant battle with farms, they’re trying to burn the farms down to chase you away. Both of them have been attacked in their house, my mom’s been attacked in the house when she was 80.” The golfers had reinforced Trump’s point.

Rupert threw Steenhuisen under the bus by accusing the DA-run Western Cape, saying, “The crime is bad. The crime is terrible, sir. Mr Steenhuisen won’t admit to it, but he runs the Western Cape where I live, and the biggest murder rate is in the Cape Flats. Gangs! We’ve got gang warfare like your M33. We’ve got equivalents there”.

The South Africans effectively argued that there was no genocide of white farmers because we murder everyone! South Africa was portrayed by its own delegation as a gang infested, crime ridden, murderous society, desperately needing American help. Investors and tourists must have been horrified.

One of the most entertaining moments of the evening was a tweet from Malema who wrote, “A group of older men meet in Washington to gossip about me.”

Ramaphosa could have immediately salvaged the situation by condemning Malema, Zuma, and denouncing the “Kill the Boer” song, but he failed to do so. In March 2025, the Presidency had refused to condemn the singing of the song, and Ramaphosa, on foreign soil, was no different.

Ramaphosa lied to Trump on the issue of the Expropriation Act, obfuscating that our law specifically allows for expropriation without compensation, albeit that this has nothing to do with race – yet. Ramaphosa attempted to back up his lie with the appearance of trade union leader Zingiswa Losi, who, too, misled the Americans by speaking of “willing buyer, willing seller”, a principle now abrogated by the Act.

The best that could be said of Ramaphosa was that he kept his cool in the midst of the Trump assault.

Of course, not all Trump’s facts were 100% correct, but Trump set out to and succeeded in embarrassing and belittling Ramaphosa. South Africa had been branded a genocidal nation, unconcerned about the safety of its own citizens. As many as 27 000 people of all races will be murdered in South Africa this year.

Later that afternoon, Ramaphosa held a press conference at the Ritz Carlton Hotel. A battered SA president was asked what he had been served for lunch. Ramaphosa was unable to recall the full menu.

Like a prize fighter past his prime, Ramaphosa needed to be carried out of Washington like the flag bearer on the White House lawns.

• Howard Sackstein is chairperson of the SA Jewish Report, but writes in his personal capacity.