On our debut show, The Debrief, I sat down to discuss what had happened after I went to a media briefing at the Department of International Relations and Cooperation. And from that briefing, I immediately knew something serious was unfolding.
The briefing came just a day after the US ambassador to South Africa, Brent Bozell, made his first public remarks at a business conference. What should have been a fairly standard diplomatic appearance quickly became controversial. The ambassador spoke about trade and repeated the familiar Trump-era line that relationships must be reciprocal, with the implication that American companies are somehow doing South Africa a favour by operating here. But the speech became far more explosive when he turned to South Africa’s relationship with Iran and to the long-running debate around the chant “Kill the Boer.”
He said South Africa should rethink its friendship with what he called a “pariah”, referring to Iran. That was already bound to provoke debate because South Africa’s relationship with Iran has long irritated parts of the American political establishment, especially since South Africa took Israel to the International Court of Justice. But his comments on the court ruling on the political chant “Kill the Boer” really escalated matters.
This chant has been the subject of years of political and legal battles in South Africa. Our highest courts have ruled that, in context, it is not hate speech. People can disagree with that judgment, but in a constitutional democracy, court rulings matter. The ambassador signalled that he did not care what South African courts had said and insisted that he viewed the chant as hate speech. That crossed a diplomatic line.
For the South African government, this was not simply about a disagreement over politics. It was about a foreign diplomat openly dismissing the authority of South African courts and inserting himself into a sensitive domestic debate.
That is why DIRCO moved quickly to summon him.
In diplomatic language, this is called a démarche, which is essentially a formal warning from a host country to a diplomat that their conduct or comments are unacceptable. What made the moment even more striking is that South Africa had reasons to object to this ambassador long before he arrived. He has a history of controversial remarks about the ANC and South Africa.
Pretoria could have refused his credentials and asked Washington to send someone else. Instead, the government accepted him, despite reservations, because South Africa’s foreign policy generally prefers engagement over escalation. The thinking was that keeping channels of communication open would be better than cutting them off.
At the briefing, Minister Ronald Lamola made that logic clear. South Africa had chosen the bridge-building route. But that did not mean the ambassador had a free pass to disregard the country’s constitutional order. According to Lamola, the ambassador later expressed regret and apologised. He also acknowledged that after visiting places like the Apartheid Museum and District Six, he had gained a better understanding of South Africa’s history and the need for redress.
This understanding mattered because one of the deeper tensions in this dispute is that some on the right, both in South Africa and the United States, attack transformation and redress measures without engaging the historical reasons they exist. The bigger issue is the deteriorating relationship between Pretoria and Washington under Trump. Since Trump’s return, there have been tariffs, threats and growing hostility toward South Africa’s foreign policy positions.
The current conflict involving Iran makes things even more fraught because the United States increasingly wants countries to choose sides. South Africa is resisting that pressure, saying it remains non-aligned and guided by international law.
That position is often criticised as inconsistent, but Pretoria argues that international law is in South Africa’s interest. It protects smaller states from the whims of powerful ones. For that reason, South Africa says it will not simply follow Washington’s line on Iran or any other conflict.
For me, last week’s story was about more than one ambassador’s loose comments. It was about sovereignty, diplomacy and the limits of foreign interference. South Africa was right to push back. You can disagree with our courts, our laws or our politics, but if you are a diplomat posted here, you do not get to dismiss the constitutional framework that governs this country.
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