Roelf Meyer, South African Ambassador: Trump has been misled

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1:52world would be a better world for men too. We need this is fire. We need healing. We need trust. These companies don't really, they don't care what governments do. This is a war. The first thing that we want is the war to end. For this episode, I speak to Rolf Meyer, South Africa's new ambassador to the United States. In the 1990s, he was one of the leading negotiators in the talks that helped bring apartheid to an end. Now he takes up his new post amid a serious rupture in relations with Washington. President Trump has cut aid, expelled the previous South African ambassador and offered refugee status to white Afrikaners he says are fleeing persecution, claiming the community faces genocide.

2:35The South African government rejects that allegation and Maya, himself an Afrikaner, explains what he wants President Trump to hear. I've asked many people in Washington over the period that I'm here that question, where is the misdirection of information coming from? And quite frankly, nobody has a clear answer. And I don't want to speculate. What I would like to do is to have a conversation with the president where I can state to him what really is the situation from the perspective that I hold and from the experience I hold. I think I have the legitimacy as a born Afrikaner in South Africa.

3:21I have the legitimacy to speak about the subject very clearly.

3:29Welcome to the interview from the BBC World Service with Rolf Mayer. I think that at least from my perspective the tension has not escalated. That shows improvement. Like we always said during the time of our negotiations in South Africa, if there's agreement to talk again then it's positive. It's a little bit like that but much more has to happen and we hope we can normalise. There are good intentions on both sides, expressed by the U.S. ambassador to South Africa and from the South African government side too. And we hope we can fix this. The situation reached probably a high last year with the tensions when President Ramaphosa visited, which is more than a year ago.

4:23and since then I think there's slow improvement and hopefully it will come right. How would you describe Donald Trump's claims that he made in that meeting that there's a genocide against white Afrikaner farmers in South Africa? That statement came first about when the executive order was issued in February of 2025. And I watched it back in South Africa and ask myself, I don't understand, is he talking about us? You know, I was at that stage not involved in any politics, directly or indirectly. And I started to search where it could come from and, you know, never got a clear answer. There might have been different sources based on some people that felt affected over a period of time.

5:21but the notion of a mass attack on the Afrikaner was misrepresented by those that might have conveyed the message. I mean, I'm an Afrikaner from South Africa myself and I can say that I've never experienced something of that kind. My family has never experienced all of them are still in South Africa following their own careers successfully And, you know, we found it strange. So the sources misrepresented, unfortunately, something that just doesn't exist. Can I ask how it makes you feel personally hearing those sorts of labels? I've been in politics for a long time in my earlier life. And I was very much part of the negotiations that led to the change from apartheid to democracy.

6:17who was part of the drafting of the South African Constitution as we have it today. And this level of criticism came about already at that stage, you know, of us who were in favor of the change selling out the Afrikaner. And so in a certain way, I've been used to that for a very long time. I'm talking about decades. and when you are in that situation, you learn how to deal with it and I think that's the way for which most politicians would view their role and their responsibility and that is, you know what to take serious account of and what not and I think that applies to all politicians particularly in leadership positions.

7:07Sometimes they might be wrong and sometimes they might be right but I think we have been vindicated in our situation to say what we wanted to create is an inclusive South Africa and we as Afrikaner are just as much part of that inclusive nation as anybody else. So black and white can work together and we have proved it over the last 30 years or more. I think one of the mistakes that's been made in this evaluation is the fact that South Africa has taken the advantage of the unification through the Constitution and the constitutional rights that's being protected in our Constitution in such a way that it unified us.

7:55It didn't divide us further. Of course, not everything is perfect as far as that is. But if you look again at the polls that have been conducted in recent months, it shows the opposite from what is being perceived on the outside. You mentioned the phrase selling out. Do you feel that that's what you'll be accused of if you speak out about this scheme? No, not at all. I don't see it that way and I didn't take responsibility for that accusation because it's incorrect. And, you know, to put it in a nutshell, if we didn't do what we did by creating a future South Africa through a constitutional arrangement like we have, in terms of which the constitution is the highest order in the country.

8:47We are a constitutional state. and even the president and everybody else at the executive level are subordinate to the Constitution. I think that's a major achievement from where we were as an apartheid state. If we had to stay in an apartheid state, we would have ended up in a civil war. And people who are making different claims today have no idea how close we were to that situation by the late 1980s. You've been clear just now that the claims behind this scheme are incorrect in your words. Why is Trump saying that? What do you think is behind that? I can't speak for that because I don't know.

9:33I've asked many people in Washington over the period that I'm here that question, where is the misdirection of information coming from? And quite frankly, nobody has a clear answer. And I don't want to speculate. What I would like to do is to have a conversation with the president where I can state to him what really is the situation from the perspective that I hold and from the experience I hold. I think I have the legitimacy as a born Afrikaner in South Africa. I have the legitimacy to speak about the subject very clearly. Why do you think President Ramaphosa made the decision that you were the person to negotiate with Donald Trump and his administration?

10:22Well, again, I can only speculate. That question should be asked to him, but you asked me what I think. You know, I think two factors came to mind. One is him and I trust each other. We have a long experience of working together under difficult circumstances. How to make peace in our own country with which we succeeded. And I think for that reason he trusts me and I trust him. So when he asked me to do this, I said I will do it because I trust you. Meaning I will rely on your backing. That's important. The second reason might have been the fact that he also saw the value of me being an Afrikaner, being legitimate to speak about Afrikaner interests, to entrust me with the task.

11:14But, you know, I'm not here to represent the Afrikaner only. I'm here in Washington to represent South Africa as a nation. And one of the proudest moments for me was when I could welcome the Springbok rugby team arriving on Sunday in Baltimore and saying, we are here to represent South Africa as the welcoming party for you as the Springbok team from South Africa was completely diverse in itself. And do you think Trump does trust you? Do you have any sense of that yet? Some of them maybe yes. And, you know, I speak to some of them. And I would hope that, you know, we can carry on with this conversation in a way that can really contribute towards the national interest on both sides, put it that way.

12:02because what the Trump administration, if my reading is correct, in the final instance is interested about is trade and investment and from our side the same. And that should be the basis of where we can meet, where we can have a meeting of minds and finding agreement.

12:26You're listening to the interview from the BBC World Service with me, Ione Wells. Thank you. options markets across all major asset classes. Visit your online broker and get started. See what adding futures can do for you at cmegroup.com forward slash podcast. Derivatives are not suitable for all investors and involve the risk of losing more than the amount originally deposited and any profit you might have made. This is not a recommendation or offer to buy, sell or attain any specific investment or service.

13:25I've been speaking to Rolf Mayer, South Africa's new ambassador to Washington. He held this immense gravitas in the room, the aura of somebody who has decades of political experience, negotiating experience, including negotiating an end to apartheid. He considers every word he says. I don't get the sense he would get tripped up by a tricky question, a difficult negotiation. And it's why it will be fascinating to see how he navigates negotiations with Donald Trump's administration at such a difficult time for relations between the two countries. Right, let's return to my conversation with Rolf Mayer.

13:59You mentioned your experience as a negotiator in South Africa at the end of apartheid. Do you see any parallels between the challenges you faced as a negotiator then and some of your challenges in negotiations now? You know, in my experience, both in South Africa and many other places, I was, by the way, involved for an extended period of time in Northern Ireland in the process leading up to the Good Friday Agreement and even after. So that experience and many others where I've done some work around the world told me there are certain universal characteristics, if you want to call it that. that would apply in all negotiations.

14:45You have to build a level of trust from the opposing sides. You can't expect to have a sustainable agreement at the end of negotiations if there wasn't trust involved in that process. The second is both sides have to take responsibility and take responsibility in terms of make it their own. Create ownership of the problem but also of the outcome. And the third one is, from our perspective, it has to be inclusive. It can't be sectional interest. It can't be personal or self-interest. It has to be inclusive interest. And I think that applied to both sides as well as I would say it. So those universal phenomena, I think, apply to all negotiations.

15:35And I've been exposed to those for a very long time, both in South Africa and elsewhere, as I said. And hopefully it can come in helpfully here. The scheme that the Trump administration has introduced for white Afrikaner refugees, as he describes it, would you like to see that revoked? I made the point several times publicly that I would like to see the executive order being lifted, because that is the basis of the so-called five asks to South Africa. And it means that if we can find agreement on those specific issues mentioned through that, there should be no reason why the executive order can't be lifted.

16:27What is Washington currently asking for? And are there areas you think South Africa would concede on any? It's mostly internal political issues, you know, and those can be addressed and have been addressed in many cases. The issue of refugee, the request there was from the Trump administration that South Africa should not interfere. And we said we're not going to be standing in the way of any South African who wants to leave. They've done it over the years, since 1994. There are thousands of South Africans here in the United States. There are thousands in the UK and in Australia and many other places.

17:09So there was never any intention from the South African government to prevent people from leaving the country. but there was a concern about the way in which it was applied in the beginning. That has been out of the way. That's removed. So that is not an issue anymore. The second was the question of land expropriation. The Act passed by Parliament in 2024. that has been referred to the courts for judgment on whether it's constitutional in its application. And the court judgment is to come, probably only by next year, but everybody, including the U.S. administration, said they're prepared to wait for the court ruling.

18:01The third one is the question of hate speech, particular songs that have been used by certain political groupings in the country. Our constitutional court ruled that it's not unconstitutional. But what we have also said is that when it comes to incitement of violence of any kind, we should take position against that, including these songs if it incites violence. And the fourth one would be the question of rural safety. Now, South Africa has challenges with the prevention of crime or the combating of crime and dealing with crime results. It's a problem and it's all out. it's not rural it's not farm attacks only in fact if you look at the total picture the huge levels of crime in the black townships in South Africa is of the biggest concern proportionally far more than anything else and when we have to address the problem of crime and label political or at least priority crimes we have to look at the total picture not only one section of that crime, admitting that it might be a problem, but at the same time take account of the whole picture.

19:36And I think there is understanding for that. And by the way, I think the United States can help us with resources on combating crime. They have the ability. They've been successful in some areas. If I look around me, even in Washington, you know crime is an issue so much everywhere and South Africa unfortunately has been exposed to levels of crime that is totally unacceptable but if there are resources and technical support that we can source from the US it would be very helpful and I think that is part of the discussion that's going on What kind of support in particular would you like from the US?

20:21Well, on the technical side, there's equipment here that we don't have in South Africa, for instance. Are you talking just military equipment, police equipment? No, police equipment. Reactionary stuff, reactionary equipment that you can use to speed up your reaction time, things like that. And Larry Bartlett, who's the former director of the Refugee Assistance Program here in the U.S., has gone as far as to say that this executive order could be illegal, that it doesn't follow the U.S.'s definition of a refugee. Do you agree with that characterization? I would rather not go into that speculation.

21:03It's not part of our mission here to criticize and or analyze US laws and or executive orders. We have to do what is necessary from the South African perspective and commit ourselves to improve the life of all South Africans, including those that we'd consider becoming refugees to the United States. The point is those thousands of South Africans that are residing in the US and still claim to keep up their South African citizenship, and I've met numbers of them in recent weeks here in the US, have left the country without a problem. But they keep their link. And I would like to think that those that qualify for refugee status in the U.S.

22:03would keep their link with South Africa too. And maybe at some stage return to South Africa, which they are entitled to do. I appreciate you. You don't want to speculate on U.S. law. But more generally, what do you make of the fact that here in the US now, the majority of refugees that have been admitted to this country have been South African? Well, that is a decision by this administration. I'm not going to comment on that. We make decisions in South Africa that I would respect others not to comment on, expect others not to comment on. And I think that is the way in which we respect each other.

22:44Your predecessor here was sent away after being too critical of Donald Trump, according to the Trump administration. Do you feel you can speak as candidly as you want to in this role? Well, I am here to represent my government, President Ramaphosa and the government of national unity that represents South Africa. I'm being appointed by that government. And I will follow the instructions. And in the second instance, I'm a diplomat in the role that I fulfill at the moment or that I was prepared to accept. and for that reason I'm going to follow the rules. And finally, are you optimistic about how the next few months will pan out?

23:35Do you think there is going to be an improvement in relations? You mentioned at the start that there hadn't been an escalation but what would it take to get improvement? We are all the time in sensitive stages of this interaction with State Department, with the National Security Council, in other words with the White House. and other institutions of authority in the United States. And it's an ongoing process. I would like to think that the fact that the U.S. has an ambassador in Pretoria, which was not the case last year, May, the fact that we have an ambassador here, which was not the case last year, May, and the two of us, by the way, get along quite well, Ambassador Bozell and myself, maybe because we are both a little bit more senior and we can interact and understand each other.

24:32Tiff it, yes, but at least we can talk and it reminds me of a successful dialogue that can also go forward on that basis. So at our level, I think there are good signs and we have to keep on advising our governments respectively and try to steer the direction of where the solutions lie. And I see that it's my business.

25:02Thank you for listening to The Interview. You'll find more in-depth conversations on The Interview wherever you get your BBC podcasts, including a conversation with Google CEO Sundar Pichai, as well as interviews with former Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard and many others. Until the next time, bye for now.

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