US President Donald Trump.
The Oval Office, May 2025: A stage for a performance of power, pretence and profound racial anxieties. When President Cyril Ramaphosa met US President Donald Trump it revealed more about strategic absences and subtexts than explicit declarations. It was a stark microcosm of enduring global racial anxieties, the complex interplay of power and capital, and a problematic pursuit of “manhood” deeply rooted in colonial legacies.
Trump, ever the showman, aggressively framed the “white genocide” myth, playing videos of Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema and uMkhonto weSizwe party members “clamouring for land”. Ramaphosa, visibly uncomfortable but composed, responded with measured diplomacy, clarifying that these were not official government policies and highlighting that crime affects all South Africans, predominantly black people. Yet, the absence of Land Reform Minister Mzwanele Nyhontso in the South African delegation was conspicuous. This omission, whether deliberate or not, implicitly de-politicised the land question, framing it as an economic or crime issue rather than a matter of historical justice.
Imagine a strong, unwavering Pan-African voice present — one imbued with the spirit of Steve Biko’s Black Consciousness or Robert Sobukwe’s unapologetic assertion of African dignity. Such a presence would have offered unyielding clarity, capable of cutting through the simplistic, racially charged narratives with the sharp incision of truth. It could have forced a recognition of the fundamental dignity and agency of African people, rather than allowing the conversation to be framed solely by Western anxieties and historical amnesia. The “white genocide” myth thrives precisely in the absence of such a robust counter-narrative.
John Steenhuisen’s intervention, as agriculture minister, to reassure Trump that his party joined the government of national unity “precisely to keep those people [EFF and MK party] out of power”, was a calculated performance. It was a public disavowal for a white Western audience, implicitly legitimising the “white genocide” narrative as a concern, even while attempting to reframe it as a generalised “crime problem”. This act sought to reassure international capital and Western powers that responsible leadership was in power, capable of containing radical black aspirations.
The role of South African billionaire Johann Rupert in the delegation further exposed capital’s chameleonic hypocrisy. The presence of Rupert alongside Trump, appealing for assistance with crime and advocating for business interests, highlights how capital consistently pursues self-interest across political phases. Rupert’s concerns about the economy, and even his philanthropic efforts, can be interpreted as strategies to maintain stability and privilege for capital, regardless of which political party is in power. This dynamic illustrates academic Cedric Robinson’s concept of “racial capitalism”, where capitalism and racism are “deeply intertwined”, perpetuating existing wealth structures.
The inclusion of white South African professional golfers Ernie Els and Retief Goosen as a “gesture to the golf-obsessed US president” trivialised the gravity of the discussions. These figures, as other “ouens at the braai” — Trump’s white South African golfing buddies — represented a demographic whose contributions amounted to little more than white noise and complaints, a self-stifling of their inherent bigotry that nonetheless seeped through every sycophantic murmur. This informal setting amplified white grievances, reinforcing an echo chamber of threatened supremacy.
This complex tapestry of privilege and anxiety finds a curious parallel in the “white flight” to Australia in the 1990s. This exodus was not primarily driven by political persecution, but by the perceived “unbearable prospect of being ruled by the ANC, by black people”. It was a flight from the perceived loss of racial hierarchy. The conflation of “refugee” with “asylum seeker” in their journey, particularly amplified by Trump’s explicit acceptance of “white Afrikaners” as “refugees”, exposes a profound racism. They were, in essence, asylum seekers from a future where they were no longer at the apex of the racial food chain, seeking a moment of the white man, in Frantz Fanon’s terms, “wanting to be a man”.
Fanon profoundly explores the colonised subject’s yearning “to be a man” in a system that denies their humanity. Here, we see an inversion: the white man, failing to maintain his hegemonic “manhood” in post-apartheid South Africa, seeks to reclaim it within the idiocy that is Trump’s version of masculinity. This movement from the inability to be an unchallenged “white man” in South Africa, to the fervent desire to be a man, a dream, within the fantasy of the American dream, is critical. For these individuals, the “American Dream” isn’t merely about prosperity; it’s about re-inscribing a racialised hierarchy, a yearning for a mythical past of unquestioned white supremacy. This aspiration to “be a man” in Trump’s mould is a desperate attempt to validate a crumbling identity, a yearning for recognition from a figure who, like them, perceives the world through a lens of racial grievance.
As writer and civil rights activist James Baldwin understood, the concept of white superiority is a delusion that prevents true liberation for both oppressor and oppressed. Edward Said’s Orientalism illuminates how the West constructs the “Other” — here, South Africa and its black leadership — as a threat to be contained, precisely because it challenges white global hegemony. And literary theorist and feminist critic Gayatri Spivak’s query, “Can the subaltern speak?”, finds uncomfortable resonance when the subaltern’s voice is drowned out or replaced by dangerous fictions.
Ultimately, the Trump-Ramaphosa meeting, and the narratives surrounding it, reveal a complex nexus of racial anxiety, political performance and the problematic quest for a racialised “manhood”. This pursuit of “manhood” in Trump’s fantasy of America, escaping the perceived indignities of a transforming South Africa, is a tragic testament to the enduring power of racialised anxiety. It is a dream built on sand, a fleeting moment of self-affirmation within a larger, more destructive hallucination. This is not about being “man enough” in the Trumpian sense; it is about confronting the uncomfortable truths of power, privilege, and the enduring struggle for genuine humanity, for all of us.
Ali Ridha Khan is a fellow at the Centre for Humanities Research at the University of the Western Cape.