US President Donald Trump meets South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, May 21, 2025, in Washington.Photo:VCG

US President Donald Trump confronted visiting South African President Cyril Ramaphosa on Wednesday local time with conspiracy theories on "white genocide" in South Africa, which Ramaphosa firmly denied, the Xinhua News Agency reported Wednesday local time.

During their meeting in the Oval Office, Trump accused South Africa of "white genocide" and unfair land seizures, and then unexpectedly presented a video and a stack of printed news articles which he said proved his allegations, Xinhua reported.

Ramaphosa, who arrived in Washington in hopes of improving trade terms and easing bilateral tensions, rejected Trump's assertions during the meeting. He refuted the notion that white South Africans are fleeing the country due to racist policies. He said there was crime in South Africa and the majority of victims were Black, Xinhua reported.

News outlets were shocked by Trump's rudeness, saying most of the information that he used during the meeting to try to prove that "white genocide" was happening in South Africa had "repeatedly been disproven," according to Xinhua.

The Guardian said, "Trump ambushed the South African president," and the "hectoring stunt" set up the most tense Oval Office encounter since Trump's bullying of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in February. 

The meeting was described by some news outlets as another White House ambush. CNN reported that Ramaphosa feared he could face Zelensky-style onslaught in White House. 

The meeting is "make-or-break" and one that requires "supreme negotiation tactics" by Ramaphosa, Neo Letswalo, a research associate at the University of Johannesburg told CNN. 

"Drawing from Zelensky's meeting with Donald Trump and JD Vance, we know that the Oval Office is currently or at least for the next five years, a tricky place to be," Letswalo said.

AFP reported the hot, confined space of the Oval Office adds to the pressure-cooker environment and invitation to it has become a ticket to a brutal political ambush. 

US President Donald Trump meets South Africa's President Cyril Ramaphosa in the Oval Office of the White House, Wednesday, May 21, 2025, in Washington.Photo:VCG

An orchestrated event

According to a CNN report, moments before Trump escorted Ramaphosa into the Oval Office, White House aides were seen wheeling two-large screen televisions down the driveway and into the West Wing, which were later used to screen a video that was claimed to be evidence for "genocide" claim. 

"Of the laundry list of conspiracy theories brought out at Trump's meeting with South African President Cyril Ramaphosa today, almost everything has been debunked. Some South Africans have said that they believe that the information is "AfriForum propaganda"-a White Afrikaner lobby group criticized as being a White nationalist group," CNN reported. 

Trump ambushed Ramaphosa by playing him the video that he falsely claimed proved genocide was being committed against white people under "the opposite of apartheid," the Guardian reported.

Ramaphosa quietly but firmly pushed back, pointing out that the views expressed in the video are not government policy, the Guardian reported.

Trump kept returning to the theme during Wednesday's televised meeting. He said: "Now I will say, apartheid: terrible. That was the biggest threat. That was reported all the time. This is sort of the opposite of apartheid," the Guardian reported.

But Ramaphosa maintained an even tone, observing: "We were taught by Nelson Mandela that whenever there are problems, people need to sit down around the table and talk about them. And this is precisely what we would also like to talk about," the Guardian reported.

Ramaphosa tried to rebuff the assertions of the US President, but was frequently interrupted. US President had staff play a video consisting mostly of years-old clips of inflammatory speeches by some South African politicians that have been circulating on social media, Reuters reported. 

Usually, during such kind of a public meeting between foreign leaders, even if there are differences, they wouldn't be expressed in such a setting. However, US President's unexpected move was, in fact, a statement directed at the domestic audience in the US, Lü Xiang, an expert on US studies and a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times on Thursday.

"The view denies the historical significance of the liberation movement in Africa and portrays South Africa as a country that specifically persecutes white people, which is very unfair both to history and to South Africa," said Lü.

Strained relations 

The clash came at a time of strained relations between the two countries. Since Ramaphosa signed the Expropriation Act into law in January, Trump has criticized the land reform law for "discriminating" against the country's white people, Xinhua reported. 

In recent months, Trump has repeatedly criticized South Africa, most notably by canceling the US President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief funding and claiming that a "genocide" against white South Africans is underway, an allegation denied by the South African government, according to Xinhua.

South Africa is slated to host the Group of 20 (G20) gathering later this year of the world's largest economies, but the US leader's frustration with Ramaphosa's government has raised the possibility that the US could boycott the event, the US media outlet the Hill reported.