Roelf Meyer, South African Ambassador: Trump has been misled

The Interview

South African Ambassador Roelf Mayer discusses the current diplomatic rift between South Africa and the Trump administration. He addresses a

Key takeaways

• Roelf Mayer denies that there is a mass attack or genocide occurring against the Afrikaner community in South Africa.
• The ambassador identifies misdirected information in Washington as a primary cause of tension with the Trump administration.

Main topics

• US-South Africa diplomatic relations
• Afrikaner refugee claims

Notable quotes

The notion of a mass attack on the Afrikaner was misrepresented by those that might have conveyed the message.

Conclusion

The episode provides a high-level diplomatic perspective on navigating

Transcript preview

Speaker 2 (0:00) This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Speaker 8 (0:05) World of Secrets is where untold stories are exposed. In the new series, a scandal inside one of Indonesia's vast network of Islamic boarding schools. I Speaker 1 (0:17) kept telling myself, don't end up with him alone. And Speaker 8 (0:21) how former pupils have turned detective, daring to speak out against an institution that wants them silent. Speaker 8 (0:32) World of Secrets, Catching My Teacher. Listen now, wherever you get your BBC podcasts. Speaker 3 (0:43) Welcome to the Haunted Library. Have you come in search of a tale? This podcast invites you to browse the shelves and find stories that will linger long after you've left this place. From gothic masterpieces to pulpy penny dreadfuls, join me, Colin Morgan, with new episodes twice a week. Find The Haunted Library wherever you get your podcasts. Speaker 6 (1:12) Hello, I'm Ione Wells, and this is the interview from the BBC World Service, the best conversations coming out of the BBC. People shaping our world from all over the world. Speaker 3 (1:23) I want to get freedom. I like that freedom. Speaker 8 (1:26) A Speaker 6 (1:26) gender equal Speaker 8 (1:27) world would be a better world for men too. We need this as fire. We need healing. We need trust. These companies don't really, they don't care what governments do. Speaker 7 (1:36) This is a war. Speaker 3 (1:37) The first thing that we want is the war to end. Speaker 6 (1:42) For this episode, I speak to Rolf Mayer, 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. The South African government rejects that allegation, and Meier, himself an Afrikaner, explains what he wants President Trump to hear. Speaker 4 (2:18) 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. I have the legitimacy to speak about the subject very clearly. Speaker 6 (3:04) Welcome to the interview from the BBC World Service with Rolf Mayer. Speaker 4 (3:09) 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 normalize. 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 tensions when President Ramaphosa visited, which is more than a year ago. And since then, I think there is slow improvement and hopefully it will come right. Speaker 7 (4:07) 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? Speaker 4 (4:17) That statement came first about when the executive order was issued in February of 2025. And I watched it back in South Africa and asked myself, I don't understand, is he talking about us? I was at that stage not involved in any politics, directly or indirectly. And I started to search where it could come from. Speaker 4 (4:46) Never got a clear answer. There might have been different sources based on some people that felt affected over a period of time. But 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, I've never experienced all of them, are still in South Africa, following their own careers successfully. And, you know, we found it strange. So the source is misrepresented, unfortunately, something that just doesn't exist. Speaker 7 (5:35) Could I ask how it makes you feel personally hearing those sorts of labels, though? Speaker 4 (5:40) 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. I 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 through 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