US President Donald Trump delivers remarks in Emancipation Hall as Vice President J.D. Vance looks on during inauguration ceremonies at the US Capitol in Washington, DC, on January 20, 2025. Trump takes office for his second non-consecutive term as the 47th president of the United States. (Photo by Angelina Katsanis / POOL / AFP)
To those who thought Donald Trump was someone who would “talk the talk” but not “walk the walk”, the US president would have shattered those misconceptions with his salvoes of presidential decrees even before he had warmed the executive chair in the Oval Office of the White House.
He followed through on some of his most dramatic – and even outrageous – campaign trail pledges.
In pledging to roll back everything even remotely liberal – from declaring there would henceforth only be two genders, to removing any form of race-based affirmative action, to declaring a state of emergency on the US southern border with Mexico and setting in motion the deportation of 13 million illegal immigrants, to the cancellation of green environmental commitments – Trump left no doubt that the “Make America Great Again” steamroller was in motion.
All around the world, though, analysts and government leaders were wondering whether the orders would be executed, or whether the Republican Party leader was using them as hardcore negotiating positions.
In an address filled with messianic fervour, Trump said he wanted to be remembered as a “peacemaker” but, at the same time, threatened Panama that the US would be taking back that major shipping route.
That would destabilise the whole of Latin America and make even more enemies for the US in the countries to the south of it.
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Trump also gave notice that, in its quest to underline and expand its world dominance, the US would not back down from challenges from the likes of China.
He has already said he will impose tariffs on Chinese imports and, although he has spoken to Chinese leaders, it seems we are in for a period of a tussle for global influence between the two countries.
China is a lot stronger than when Trump last took office in 2016 and is unlikely to meekly accept the new “Pax Americana”.
And that is where it gets interesting for South Africa.
Many believe that Trump will follow through on Republican Party rhetoric and punish this country by excluding it from the African Growth and Opportunities Act (Agoa), under which some African countries enjoy preferential trade treatment in exports to the US.
The Republicans are miffed by our membership of Brics, as well as our closeness with Russia, to say nothing of our attitude in calling out Israeli genocide in Gaza in the International Court of Justice.
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However, retaliation using Agoa would serve only to drive South Africa – one of the most influential countries on our continent – further into the arms of the Chinese.
And the reality is that, because Africa is bound to be a terrain on which Washington and Beijing arm wrestle for influence, America would lose an opportunity to exert its own sway here.
Whether Trump is prepared to forego that bigger geopolitical picture in favour of a minor, petty retaliation remains to be seen.
Whatever happens, the world will never be the same again. Whether Trump will be able to carry out the radical transformation at home and abroad, which is his vision, remains to be seen.
Apart from anything else, he can’t do everything he promised at once and succeed.
And the faithful who voted him into office –and who are concerned with the pork barrel politics of mere survival – are more concerned with domestic problems than they are with changing the world.
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