President John Dramani Mahama, has condemned U.S. President Donald Trump for his unfounded accusations against South African President Cyril Ramaphosa, describing them as deeply offensive to the people of Africa and a distortion of historical truth.
In an opinion piece, President Mahama criticised Trump’s assertion of “white genocide” in South Africa, which was made during a meeting between the two leaders at the White House.
Mahama argued that the claims disregard the legacy of colonisation and apartheid, under which millions of Black South Africans suffered systemic oppression, displacement, and death.
“It is not enough to be affronted by these claims, or to casually dismiss them as untruths,” Mahama wrote. “These statements are a clear example of how language can be leveraged to extend the effects of previous injustices.”
He noted that apartheid’s impact cannot be erased by simply declaring it over, particularly when no concrete reparative action has followed.
Despite the end of apartheid, Mahama pointed out, the vast majority of South Africa’s wealth remains in the hands of a small white minority, and racially exclusive enclaves like Orania and Kleinfontein still exist openly.
Mahama, drawing from his own memories of anti-apartheid activism in Ghana during his youth, reflected on the pan-African solidarity that once defined the continent’s resistance to colonial and racist regimes. He invoked the Sharpeville massacre of 1960 and the Soweto uprising of 1976 as painful milestones in a shared history of African resistance.
“Had the Black South Africans wanted to exact revenge on Afrikaners, surely they would have done so decades ago,” Mahama stated, dismissing Trump’s claims as baseless and inflammatory. He questioned why, if Afrikaners truly feared for their lives, they had not fled to places like Orania where white separatism is practiced.
Mahama also accused Trump of weaponising misinformation, citing the use of unrelated images—some from the Democratic Republic of Congo—as so-called evidence of white-targeted violence in South Africa.
He said President Ramaphosa had been ambushed and misrepresented, despite insisting that his administration did not sanction racial discrimination.
Quoting both Ngũgĩ wa Thiong’o and Archbishop Desmond Tutu, Mahama stressed the importance of memory, truth, and historical justice in building a peaceful future. He warned that ignoring or distorting Africa’s past risks perpetuating cycles of violence and marginalisation.
“Our world is in real crisis,” he concluded. “Real refugees are being turned away, real genocides are happening in real-time… and yet we must waste breath on fabrications that dishonour our past and derail our progress.”
