Why South Africa is slipping into the Sino-Russian orbit. Report Economist
The African National Congress, the ruling party of South Africa, is full of Russian sympathizers. The deepening of the Economist
South Africa's navy, like much of the country, is dilapidated. Its fleet spends less than half as much time at sea as it did a decade ago. It has few functioning vessels, a result of budget cuts by the ruling African National Congress (ANC). It is therefore logical that the country welcomes better fleets that can teach it something.
But the hospitality of the Russian and Chinese navies for exercises from February 17 to 27 is not just an occasion for sailors to say hello to each other. Coinciding with the anniversary of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the operations underscore how the Chinese government, despite declaring itself war-neutral, is entering the Sino-Russian orbit, partly by choice. The resulting frustrations of the West with South Africa highlight how the middle-level countries that declare themselves "non-aligned" are today often engaged in a difficult balancing act – writes The Economist .
South Africa's government has a soft spot for Russia
The ANC has long had a soft spot for Russia. Party leaders, such as Naledi Pandor, South Africa's foreign minister, are used to telling Western diplomats how the Soviet Union supported the anti-apartheid struggle. When Pandor met with Josep Borrell, the EU's foreign policy chief, earlier this month, she said the West had no lessons to offer South Africa because it has never given guns to those fighting for freedom. from white dominance, according to two people familiar with the meeting. Russia is also important for pragmatic reasons; China even more. In 2010, South Africa joined the BRICS, a group of large emerging markets. Membership is important for South Africa, by far the bloc's smallest economy, because it allows it to sit at a table with powerful countries.
For most of the 21st century the West understood South Africa's desire to have it both ways. Guilt over their support of white domination tempered rich-country criticism of the ANC. South Africa was the gateway to the rest of the continent. As long as it was still open to trade, investment and tourists from America and Europe, the ANC had a pass. Western countries still account for four of the top five destinations for South African exports. They also account for the majority of foreign direct investment and international holders of South African assets.
But the war in Ukraine has drawn attention to South Africa's apparent non-alignment. Last March it was one of 26 of 54 African countries not to condemn Russia's invasion at the UN General Assembly. This irritated but did not surprise Western diplomats. Between 2017 and 2021, South Africa averaged just 23 percent of American votes annually, ten percentage points below the average for all countries, nearly on par with nations like The Economist, according to an analysis by The Economist. Cuba and Zimbabwe. The country was among the minority of UN members who did not condemn Russia's invasion of Crimea in 2014.
South Africa's abstention in October 2022 on whether to condemn Russia's annexation of Ukrainian territory caused more frustration. A month earlier, Cyril Ramaphosa had become the first head of state to receive a private visit to the White House from Joe Biden, a sign of American efforts to woo South Africa. Weeks later, Ramaphosa was also the first to pay a state visit to Britain under the reign of King Charles III. Western diplomats say they consulted South Africans on the text of the UN resolution, but Ramaphosa ultimately overrode his diplomats and abstained.
Ramaphosa has been given the benefit of the doubt. He had a domestic election to win in December and needed to keep pro-Russian party members quiet. But in November a superyacht owned by a sanctioned Russian businessman was reportedly headed to Cape Town (he ultimately settled on the Maldives). Even more disturbingly, the same month a Russian merchant ship was sighted in South African waters under sanctions for its alleged role in transporting material. The vessel, known as Lady R, turned off its tracking device before docking at a naval base in early December. Eyewitnesses reported that the cargo was unloaded in the dark. Diplomatic sources fear that other material may have been loaded onto the ship later. Thandi Modise, the defense minister, did not give a full account of the events, saying only that the ship was carrying an order for munitions placed before the Covid-19 pandemic. “We remain dissatisfied,” says a Western diplomat. (A spokesman for Ms. Modise did not respond to requests for comment).
Then, in January, a visit from Sergei Lavrov came. Along with her Russian counterpart, Ms Pandor said calling for Russia to withdraw from Ukraine would be "simplistic and childish" given the "massive arms transfer" the West has provided to Kiev. He then said that the BRICS bloc should be part of "a redesigned global order", to the delight of Moscow and Beijing.
Troubled waters
Now there are naval exercises . South Africa hosted Russia and China in 2019, causing far less fanfare. The country cooperates with Western navies, including France's, and regularly welcomes Western politicians. But hosting a Russian vessel with the pro-war “Z” logo at a time when Vladimir Putin’s troops are massacring Ukrainians on the battlefield marks a change.
The government's actions are drawing attention to links between individual ANC politicians and Russia. In 2021 David Mabuza, the vice president, spent more than a month in Russia for a "scheduled medical consultation". Ms Modise, a rare female guerrilla from the ANC's armed wing during the struggle, attended a security summit in Moscow with defense ministers from 34 other countries in August. Western diplomats consider dialogue with her a lost cause. There are echoes, one of them observes, of Russia's modus operandi in more fragile African countries, such as Mali and the Central African Republic, where the Wagner Group of mercenaries are shoring up regimes. Russia cannot match the economic importance of the West to South Africa, but it can try to target the more flexible elites, especially if they have latent anti-Western sympathies.
The West is still trying to figure out how to respond to the ANC's pro-Russian moves. Some officials fear that speaking out or issuing threats could push ANC politicians even further eastward. Diplomats note that in South Africa what may appear to be a conspiracy is often chaos. Ministries are isolated; the foreign ministry was unaware of Lady R's arrival. But officials on the ground all agree that defending a soft approach to ANC governance in their respective capitals is becoming more difficult.
Some in the West are in favor of a harder line. US Senators privately question why South Africa should have preferential trading terms with the US, as it does through the African Growth and Opportunity Act, when in fact it is supporting an enemy in war. Some American officials want their law enforcement and intelligence agencies to take a closer look at Russia's ties to corrupt South African elites. Western governments are considering warning Ramaphosa of the consequences of his possible participation in the Russia-Africa summit scheduled for this year.
The tragedy is that South Africa needs all the help it can get. It is no longer the singular powerhouse of sub-Saharan Africa it was in the 2000s. Nor has it gone unnoticed that the country is falling apart: there are rolling blackouts and the faucets are regularly running dry (when Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen American, came to visit last month, cans of water had to be delivered to her lodgings because the taps were dry). Organized crime is rampant. Yet, just when it should be getting closer to its main sources of trade and investment, it is moving away. To Western friends, South Africa's claims to global significance appear increasingly ridiculous. His sympathy for Russia only increases it.
(Excerpt from the press release of eprcommunication)
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/sudafrica-russia-cina/ on Sun, 26 Feb 2023 06:24:59 +0000.