Dutton’s comments offend South Africa

AUSTRALIA: The South African government has demanded that Australian Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton retract his comments suggesting white farmers were being persecuted and should receive humanitarian protection from a ‘‘civilised country’’ such as Australia.

Dutton said he had asked his department to look into admitting a special refugee intake of white South Africans, who he said ‘‘deserve special attention’’ because they were facing ‘‘horrific circumstances’’.

The Greens have come out staunchly opposed to a new initiative form Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton to look into a special refugee intake of white South African farmers subject to violence in their homeland.

Dutton said there were already large numbers of South African expatriates living in Australia. ‘‘They work hard, they integrate well into Australian society, they contribute to make us a better country and they’re the sorts of migrants that we want to bring into our country,’’ Dutton told radio station 2GB on Thursday.

The South African Foreign Ministry swiftly rejected Dutton’s characterisation and expressed regret that he had not used diplomatic channels.

‘‘The South African Government is offended by the statements which have been attributed to the Australian Home Affairs Minister and a full retraction is expected,’’ a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry added in a further statement yesterday morning.

Statistics on farm murders are disputed, but reports have suggested as many as one white farmer a week is killed - and that the group is at a greater risk of being murdered than policemen.

According to the Africa Check fact-checking website, both the police and the AfriForum Research Institute recorded 74 farm murders in 2016-17, but the race of the victims was not reported.

Canberra’s high commissioner in Pretoria has reportedly been summoned for a dressing-down by the South African government following Dutton’s comments.

White Afrikaners are a minority in South Africa but still own upwards of 70 per cent of the country’s agricultural land, as a legacy of apartheid. Again, the numbers are contested – the South African government says only 8 per cent of farmland is in black hands, based on title deeds.

Since the end of white minority rule in 1994, the governing African National Congress has redistributed farmland by finding willing buyers for willing sellers.

There are now moves within the Parliament, backed by the ANC and other left-wing parties, to change the constitution to allow compulsory redistribution of land without compensation.

When asked yesterday if the Australian government would retract Dutton’s statement, Foreign Affairs Minister Julie Bishop said she was regularly in contact with the South Africans and ‘‘we closely monitor reports, for example, on murder rates and patterns across the country in cities and rural areas’’.

Bishop also urged the South African government to protect all citizens and noted Australia’s concern about the 19,000 murders reported in the country in 2017, a danger reflected in the Smartraveller travel advice.

‘‘The message that we urge upon the South African government is that they seek to ensure the security of all their citizens and we certainly urge the South African government to ensure that any changes to land ownership, for example, are not disruptive to the economy nor lead to violence,’’ she told ABC radio.

Bishop also rejected the suggestion there were double standards in the government’s approach to refugees. – Fairfax