James now has the ANC firmly in his sights. H Res 145 should be considered a warning shot across the bow of the ANC government. A congressional call to reassess relations with a country previously considered an ally is highly unusual.
Although the resolution is non-binding and crucially lacks the support of the Democrats on the Africa subcommittee, it is of symbolic importance. It is a clear signal of where the Republican Party is going with its foreign policy on South Africa – a new critical scrutiny of the ANC’s foreign policy conduct and a clear intention to hold the ANC and its leaders accountable when they are considered to be acting against US interests.
For the resolution to pass the House of Representatives, the Republican chairperson will have to reach across the aisle to build a consensus with Democrats on the Africa subcommittee. The way the House operates, and with tight partisan margins, it will be difficult to pass, at least as it is currently drafted. For now, it is unlikely that Democrats will back the resolution, not least because it also takes a partisan potshot at the Biden administration’s “climate colonialism”.
However, the ANC is increasingly vulnerable in Congress and the resolution is a clear sign of serious trouble ahead for its relations with the US. While Democrats no doubt take issue with some of the resolution’s particulars, they too are concerned by the trajectory of the relationship. Last year, the House overwhelmingly passed the “Countering Russian Malign Activities in Africa Act”, targeting the Wagner Group, other Russian actors and associated African officials for possible sanctions.
It was the Africa subcommittee of another Republican Congress that implemented smart sanctions against the leaders of Zanu-PF in Zimbabwe in 2006 because of corruption and gross human rights violations related to the expropriation of property. Those sanctions remain in place and they have made Zimbabwe a pariah state.
The ANC’s decision to host a military exercise with China and Russia on the first anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine seems to mark a turning point. The Mosi II exercise was widely reported in the mainstream media in the US and across Nato countries. Several senior Western leaders, including German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz, criticised the exercise, its timing and the opportunity it gave the Kremlin for propaganda about its new hypersonic weapons.
It is not only the ANC’s relationship with Moscow that sparked resolution H Res 145, but more importantly President Cyril Ramaphosa and the ANC’s close relationship with Beijing. The new Republican-controlled Congress is laser-focused on China. US bilateral relations will increasingly be viewed in a strategic competition framework with China. Beijing and Moscow treat geopolitics competitively. Washington is following suit.
China is one of a handful of issues on which Republicans and Democrats are capable of cooperating as a national security issue. The new House select committee on China chaired by Mike Gallagher is a case in point. On China, Republicans and Democrats are putting differences aside to work together on a reassessment of the US relationship with China across foreign policy, defence and trade and investment.
Unlike days past, South Africa has few friends in Congress. It has not had an effective ambassador in Washington since Barbara Masekela in the 1990s. These days, South Africa’s ambassadors are seldom seen walking the halls of power. Instead, the US-SA relationship runs directly between the White House and Ramaphosa, making him its sole remaining point of success or failure.
In Congress, Ramaphosa still has strong personal relationships with a handful of senior Democrats that go back to his long-standing friendship with George Soros and his membership of the board of the International Crisis Group, the not-for-profit organisation Soros founded. But he lacks friends on the Republican side.
Soros, 92, remains a significant donor to the Democrats and he has come out publicly with strong views on China. Ramaphosa’s brother-in-law, Patrice Motsepe, continues to be an occasional visitor to Washington as a donor to several important causes, but he rarely gets involved in policy discussions.
South Africa remains the US’s largest trading partner in Africa, with a $22-billion two-way trade in 2022 underpinned by the African Growth and Opportunity Act (Agoa), while South Africa’s private sector remains dependent on capital from US institutional investors, particularly in the capital markets. The growing negative sentiment in Washington will make Congress’s renewal of Agoa, needed by 2025, increasingly unlikely, especially under an ANC government. The stakes for South Africa are not small, as it is the largest beneficiary of this non-reciprocal trade benefit, which supports tens of thousands of South African jobs. Alarmingly, the resolution calls for an accounting of the benefits South Africa receives through Agoa.
The Biden administration’s flagship global climate deal – South Africa’s $8.5-billion “Just Transition” – has been critically damaged by the revelations of its chief negotiator, André de Ruyter, about the extent of ANC leaders' direct involvement in corruption at Eskom.
H Res 145 notes that the ANC has “proved incapable of providing electricity to the South African people” due to its “chronic mismanagement”. Why would Congress put funding into this mess?
In 2019, the US Treasury sanctioned the three Gupta brothers and Salim Essa “as members of a significant corruption network” after an effective campaign by committed South Africans. When Janet Yellen, the US Secretary of the Treasury, recently had a one-on-one meeting with Ramaphosa, she made it clear that anyone who violates US sanctions against Russian aggression in the Ukraine will similarly be held to account by the US. The winds of change are blowing through Africa.
♦ VWB ♦
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