South African President Cyril Ramaphosa called for national unity after the country\u2019s new land-expropriation laws and foreign policy came under attack from US leader Donald Trump.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe need to stand united as a nation, particularly now when we are facing a harsh global wind,\u201d Ramaphosa told lawmakers in Cape Town in a reply to a debate on his state-of-the-nation address on Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI\u2019d like to repeat we will also not be bullied by anyone in the country or outside.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Trump last week froze most aid to South Africa after criticizing its relationship with Hamas and Iran and falsely claiming that the authorities were engaging in land grabs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
While South Africa\u2019s government will never allow people to be forcibly removed from their property, there remains a need for land reform more than three decades after the end of White-minority rule, according to Ramaphosa.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cLike the transformation of our society, the process of restitution is not complete. It is an ongoing process,\u201d he said. \u201cThere is still much that needs to be done to heal the divisions of the past.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A new law that Ramaphosa signed off in December gives the government the power to take land for a public purpose, such as to build roads or schools, or in the public interest, which includes efforts \u201cto bring about equitable access to all South Africa\u2019s natural resources in order to redress the results of past racial discriminatory laws or practices.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The owner of expropriated land must get \u201cjust and equitable\u201d compensation, although the act contains a provision for nothing to be paid in some instances, such as when the land isn\u2019t being used or has been acquired for speculative purposes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Ramaphosa\u2019s speech comes a week before South Africa is due to host a meeting of foreign ministers from the Group of 20 nations. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has said he will boycott the meeting to protest against its land policies and South Africa using its rotating presidency \u201cto promote \u2018solidarity, equality & sustainability.\u2019 In other words: DEI and climate change.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
President Cyril Ramaphosa has called for South Africans to unite after the country’s laws came under attack by US president Donald Trump.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":807095,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[1293,10849],"class_list":["post-811642","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-cyril-ramaphosa","tag-donald-trump"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811642","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=811642"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811642\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":811643,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/811642\/revisions\/811643"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/807095"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=811642"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=811642"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=811642"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}