I wish I could find another source to confirm this, but if true, that's basically the nuclear option to kick out all American companies and halt all mineral exports to the US.
Good news if true. Setting and defending personal boundaries is essential in any relationship and especially dealing with a narcissist. It's not that different at the international scale.
China has been buying and stealing south africa piece by piece for decades. land, mines, politicians. Everything. This will have very negative consequences for all of sa.
They are not defending their boundaries. This is just going to feed the other beast. This just cuts off americas influence on SA, and lets china go full hog into it. This was just they were waiting for.
Most of what Trump/Musk has been doing will directly benefit China. He says they are an enemy and adds tariffs but mostly China is the winner in all of this and will be long term.
trump doesn't understand this. The USA gets away with a lot of shit because it does a lot of other good. If we remove the good, we lose the tolerance for our shit.
Just like Felon...stop making electric cars or launching useful satellites and he's gonna get the reprisal of the public.... Much more than now. I assume.
I'd be pretty skeptical of this. As you said, no one else is reporting what would be huge news. I can't find the quote attributed to "a spokesperson for the South African government" anywhere else either. There isn't a named person in the article. This source seems sketchy, though I can't find any bias monitor info on them. That 'from the desk of the president' graphic is also just kinda weird.
The closest to this story I can find is this Feb 3rd story from a mining conference:
South Africa’s Minister of Minerals and Petroleum Resources, Gwede Mantashe, told delegates in his opening address that Africa should withhold minerals if funding is withdrawn.
Yeah I agree. I came across the article as I like to read up on what's going on with BRICS countries as that seems like something worth keeping an eye on. But the lack of confirmation is troublesome. Even something like a giant trade deal with China that would give them some standing to call Trump's bluff would lend some credibility. It could be that this was threatened during negotiations and someone jumped the gun to say it's now policy? If I see any more about it one way or another, I will update the post.
An article from February 3 https://www.sabcnews.com/sabcnews/minerals/?hilite=minerals by the country's public broadcaster, quotes the Minister of Minerals and Petroleum Resources, Gwede Mantashe, saying South Africa's minerals should be withheld from US, but I've seen no reports that it actually will be.
I also couldn't find anything at the government's website https://www.gov.za/, nor via DDG at Reuters or AP.
Inside the US. President Musk and the Cuck-in-Chief plan to cut the Pentagon budget in half. I mean, the defense contractors will still get plenty of cash but there won't be enough trained volunteer soldiers.