Ebrahim Rasool, the South African Ambassador to Washington has less than 72 hours to leave the United States.
The US Foreign Minister declared Ebrahim Rasool persona non grata on Friday, a spokesperson for the South African Ministry of Foreign Affairs has confirmed.
“The (US) State Department informed him yesterday that he had 72 hours to leave the country,” Chrispin Phiri said in a brief statement, confirming South African media reports.
Marco Rubio, who heads the State Department, accused Ebrahim Rasool of being a “racist politician who hates America” and US President Donald Trump, in yet another attack by the new US administration on Pretoria published on X.
South Africa particularly targeted
“Ambassador Rasool was about to meet with strategic officials at the White House. This unfortunate development has sabotaged significant progress,” laments Chrispin Phiri, after weeks of controversy and fears surrounding Pretoria’s future within the AGOA trade agreement, which allows certain goods to be exported duty-free to the United States.
South Africa has been a particular target of Washington since Donald Trump’s return to power. In a presidential decree cutting off aid, the White House tenant accused the country of treating descendants of European settlers “unfairly” and attacked the country for its genocide complaint against Israel before the International Court of Justice.
Following the South African presidency’s call for the expulsion as “regrettable,” Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola described it as “unprecedented” on state broadcaster SABC.
“In the context of normal diplomatic relations, an approach should have been taken to the ambassador to ask him to explain his comments,” the South African foreign minister said in surprise.
Ebrahim Rasool described Donald Trump as “mobilizing supremacy against the powers that be” during a webinar on Friday. “It’s unfortunate that we’re on the receiving end of tweets that don’t help repair our relationship,” he added.
The episode sparked a furious reaction in Africa’s largest economy. The radical left-wing EFF party, which came fourth in last year’s elections with just under 10% of the vote, accused Donald Trump in a statement Saturday of being the “grand wizard of a global Ku Klux Klan.”
