South Africans and Aussies have a ferocious rivalry on the sports field. But when midfielder Keanu Baccus ran on to the pitch in Qatar after half time to help Australia’s Socceroos win a historic victory against Denmark at the World Cup this month, he ...
Keanu Baccus was born in Durban and his family emigrated to Australia when he was a baby. “He really made the difference in that game,” says Australia’s assistant minister of foreign affairs, Tim Watts.
He was on Australia’s first ministerial visit to South Africa since 2014, suggesting a need for the injection of some tonic. The familiarity which Australians and South Africans feel for one another forms a solid foundation expanding all aspects of the relationship, including tourism, trade and investment, he believes.
Nonetheless, accumulated South African investment in Australia last year totalled some A$10.635-billion versus A$4.582 in Australian investment in South Africa. Watts noted that Australia is “an open trading economy” and “businesses are going to succeed or fail in the market based on their own wits”.
Watts notes that Australia is a major mining player across Africa and its mining companies have developed “very significant expertise”, particularly in extracting critical minerals. He welcomed especially South Africa’s military intervention in northern Mozambique as part of the regional force fighting Isis-affiliated jihadi extremists; its leadership in trying to defuse the Eswatini political crisis; and its hosting of the successful Ethiopian peace talks last month.
In sharp contrast, South Africa has remained “non-aligned” — or has even leaned a little towards Russia’s side and has failed to condemn its aggression at all. Watts said Australia was particularly interested in funding for the Accra Initiative which Ghana and four other sub-Sahel countries — Burkina Faso, Benin,d’Ivoire and Togo — had formed to try to prevent the growing terrorism in the Sahel spilling over on to them.
But Watts emphasised that while the governments had changed, “our fundamental national interests haven’t changed.” So the Labor government remained fully committed to the Quadrilateral strategic security dialogue with the US, India and Japan and “Aukus” with the US and UK — created under the previous government.
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