S.Africa urges mineral export ban if US funding halts

South Africa’s Minister of Mineral and Petroleum Resources, Gwede Mantashe, has called on African nations to withhold minerals from the United States, should US President Donald Trump make good on threats to withdraw funding from South Africa.

Addressing the 31st Investing in African Mining Indaba, which is taking place in Cape Town this week, Mantashe said South Africa and other African nations should not cower in fear of US threats to withdraw funding.

This comes after President Donald Trump said the US would cut all future funding to South Africa while looking into the nation’s recent move to sign a bill into law which will make it easier to expropriate land where it is in the public interest to do so.

“If they don’t give us money, let’s not give them minerals,” Mantashe said. “We are not just beggars, let us use that endowment for our benefit…If as a continent we are [paralyzed] with fear, we are going to collapse, but with minerals at our doorstep.”

Africa accounts for at least 90% of the world’s chromium and platinum, 40 percent of the world’s gold, and the largest reserves of cobalt, vanadium,
manganese, and uranium.