South Africa has appointed a former apartheid government chief negotiator during the talks that ended white rule in the 1990s as ambassador to the US, in what is seen as an attempt to improve the deeply strained diplomatic relationship between the two countries.<\/p>\n
Roelf Meyer replaces Ebrahim Rasool, who was expelled in March 2025<\/a> after he criticised the Trump administration.<\/p>\n Since Donald Trump began his second term, the US president has accused South Africa\u2019s government of racial discrimination<\/a> against white Afrikaners, who led the country during apartheid. His government has also given priority to white South Africans, who have come to the US as refugees<\/a> while almost all other refugees have been shut off.<\/p>\n Roelf Meyer at the Union Buildings in Pretoria in July last year. He said it was \u2018very important\u2019 to restore relations with the US. Photograph: Gallo Images\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Meyer, an Afrikaner, was a reformist minister in the last apartheid government, while Cyril Ramaphosa<\/a>, now president, was his opposite number in the African National Congress in the negotiations that brought about democracy in 1994. The two formed a close rapport.<\/p>\n Meyer joined the ANC in 2006. The ambassador-elect would not be giving interviews until his credentials had been accepted by the US, Ramaphosa\u2019s spokesperson, Vincent Magwenya, said.<\/p>\n \u201cAt this stage, until all administrative protocols have been completed in Washington it would be unwise for him to be speaking to the media now. I don\u2019t have a sense of timelines, as it\u2019s a state department process and we have no control over it,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n South Africa has not had an ambassador in Washington since Rasool was expelled<\/a>, accused by the US secretary of state, Marco Rubio, of being a \u201crace-baiting politician who hates America\u201d.<\/p>\n Rasool had told a thinktank event that Trump\u2019s Make America Great Again movement was a \u201csupremacist\u201d response to demographic shifts meaning that white people would soon no longer be a majority in the US.<\/p>\n In July 2025, Meyer said in an interview<\/a> that the US was an \u201cimportant partner\u201d that could not be ignored. \u201cWe have to work at restoring that relationship. I think it\u2019s very important,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd I think maybe there is something of a blame going our way, and that is that we didn\u2019t pay enough attention to keeping that relationship going over a period of time, even pre this current administration\u2019s period.\u201d<\/p>\n A 1994 photograph shows Roelf Meyer, chief apartheid government negotiator (second row, second right) next to his counterpart, the ANC\u2019s Cyril Ramaphosa, right. In the front row are, from left, Chief Mangosuthu Buthelezi of the IFP, the then President FW de Klerk, and Nelson Mandela. Photograph: Lynne Sladky\/AP<\/p>\n The 78-year-old said at the time that the hard work of being ambassador needed \u201cyouthful energy\u201d, adding, \u201cI don\u2019t think somebody of my age should take on that responsibility at this stage, quite frankly.\u201d<\/p>\n Meyer criticised \u201cAfrikaner groups that went [to Washington and] are not speaking on behalf of me as an Afrikaner, let alone the rest of the nation\u201d, saying their lobbying was \u201cdistorting the picture\u201d.<\/p>\n The conservative Afrikaner group AfriForum has promoted the idea<\/a> in Washington that the killing of white farmers is racially targeted, despite South Africa\u2019s high murder rate affecting all races.<\/p>\n Cyril Ramaphosa and Roelf Meyer in 1995, the early years of the ANC government. Photograph: Independent\/Alamy<\/p>\n