ANC links with Iran are unwise

South Africa’s growing alignment with Iran is not only abysmally amoral, but may prove to be spectacularly unwise.

The ANC government today faces among its Western trading partners a hardening of attitudes similar to that which triggered the sanctions and investment boycotts that finally undid the apartheid regime.

Consequently, the relationship and dealmaking with Iran are beginning to come under much scrutiny.

This week, the Institute for the Study of Global Anti-Semitism and Policy (ISGAP), released a report on the pattern of anti-Israeli rhetoric and behaviour from the ANC and the ties the party has developed with Iran and its proxies, Hamas, Hezbollah, as well as Russia and Qatar, in the light of South Africa’s genocide charges against Israel before the International Court of Justice (ICJ).

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ISGAP is a US-based think-tank that produces academic research, seminars and conferences to study anti-Semitism, racism and prejudice.

Because of its field of study and the fact that it gets funding from Israel, ISGAP’s work is predictably dismissed out of hand by the anti-Zionist lobby.

However, it has a credible profile in interdisciplinary scholarship and research and its annual fellowship programme at Oxford University draws international scholars.

While the ISGAP report does not try to legally rebut of the case put before the ICJ, it does rather compellingly highlight the ANC’s mala fides towards Israel.

Of course, this is partly driven by the ANC’s historical infatuation with revolution against the imperialist oppressors.

But more pragmatically, it is powered by the ANC’s insatiable need for monetary infusions. As recently revealed by former ANC treasurer-general Mathews Phosa, the party has despite public denials long relied on secret financial lifelines from unsavoury sources, including Muammar Gaddafi, to keep going.

Today, Iran, Russia and Qatar fulfil the same purpose for the party and its leadership elite.

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While there are no startling smoking gun revelations in the ISGAP report, it’s salutary to be reminded how well documented these ties are and what the costs are.

For example, the major reason for SA’s presence on the Financial Action Task Force’s greylist, is its failure to demonstrate a commitment to preventing terrorism financing.

That SA has been spared the Islamic terrorism that has ravaged much of Africa is less likely to be random good fortune than a quid pro quo for the country’s deepening alignment with Iran, which is a major sponsor of such terrorism.

On the ground, locally, the situation is becoming serious. Neighbouring Mozambique has been battling in the north an Islamist insurgency since 2017.

At least 5 000 civilians have been killed and over a million displaced. The Frelimo government is looking more fragile by the day.

Willem Els, a researcher at the Institute for Strategic Studies, painted a worrying picture of this in an address last week at a Border Management Authority conference.

There were radical elements within the South African Islamic community, News24 reports him as saying, and these were essentially unmonitored because of a lack of capacity on the part of the intelligence services, as well as a lack of political will.

There was, said Els, “a problem” with homegrown Islamic radicals moving back and forth between SA and Mozambique.

SA had become a “breeding ground” for terrorists and was vulnerable if its borders were not policed effectively.

The ANC’s making of common cause with Islamic fundamentalism is not only foolish in diplomatic terms but it is out of kilter with popular opinion.

There are no signs, however, that the ANC is walking back on its support for Iran.

The question, then, is whether the resultant strains will break the party, the government of national unity, or South Africa itself.

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