South Africa's BAD Foreign Policy Choices

When the US Ambassador to South Africa called out Pretoria's foreign policy this week, the ANC had an answer ready. The problem is that their answer made the Ambassador's point for them. In this video I look at what actually happened when Deputy President Mashatile was in Beijing and Iran's Deputy Foreign Minister was simultaneously sitting in Pretoria, and why DIRCO's defence of that situation collapsed under its own logic. Non-alignment is a specific foreign policy doctrine with a specific meaning. It is not a catch-all label you can attach to any set of relationships and call it independent thinking. I unpack what non-alignment actually means, why the ANC's version of it does not hold up, and why that distinction matters right now — at the exact moment South Africa is trying to protect its AGOA access, get 30% US tariffs lifted, and negotiate a new bilateral trade agreement. Jaco Kleynhans of Solidariteit put the real stakes plainly: it is not politicians who pay the price when trade relationships deteriorate. It is workers, manufacturers, and farmers. I also look at what President Ramaphosa told Parliament in the NCOP on 25 June, and why his statement raises a question the ANC still has not answered honestly. This is not a video about whether South Africa should be an ally of the United States. It is a video about whether the ANC's foreign policy serves South Africans, or whether it serves something else entirely. The Riaan Roux Show — Don't just know what's happening, understand what it means.