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JOHANNESBURG – The South African government plans to step up talks with billionaire Elon Musk to invest in his country of birth.
President Cyril Ramaphosa recently said he had a call with the world’s richest man after Starlink, Musk’s satellite internet service, approached the government to secure regulatory approval.
The president expects further talks with Musk as the government steps up its efforts to attract investment, Ramaphosa’s spokesperson Vincent Magwenya told Semafor Africa. “The chat was not only about Starlink, but also covered a wider set of investments that could include Tesla and Space X,” Magwenya said.
Starlink provides broadband Internet from a network of more than 5,000 satellites deployed by sister company SpaceX. It currently operates in more than a dozen African countriesincluding Nigeria, Ghana, Zimbabwe, Kenya, Malawi and Botswana. But it has failed to secure regulatory approval in several countries, including South Africa.
Ramaphosa, addressing reporters in Pretoria last week, said he told Musk: “I want you to come home and invest here.” The president added that he and Musk “will have a further discussion.”
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The government led by Ramaphosa has a dedicated program to reduce bureaucracy, and improve the ease of doing business as a way to attract investment.
A deal with a high-profile investor like Musk could help ride the wave of positive sentiment sweeping South Africa after May’s inconclusive election, which prompted the formation of a coalition government.
The country’s currency and stock markets strengthened such as consumer confidence. The rating agency Fitch last week said that the coalition government has reduced the political uncertainty associated with the elections. Fitch, in a statement on Friday, said it expected the government to continue its reform program, “which will contribute to modest real GDP growth.”
I step back
Elon Musk will seem like a strange partner for the African National Congress, the liberation party against apartheid. Musk, who left the country at 17 during apartheid, rarely talks about Africa or South Africa in his daily round of posts on X .. But last July he joined the commentators of extreme right in spreading misinformation on the platform he owns, sharing posts and claims. that white farmers were subjected to genocide in South Africa.
And in one post, in response to the anti-farmer song of the apartheid era by the fiery politician Julius Malema called President Ramaphosa. asking: “They are openly calling for the genocide of whites in South Africa. @CyrilRamaphosa, why don’t you say anything?”
In an essay on his biography written by Walter Isaacson last November, the South African writer Eve Fairbanks called out Musk for perpetuating an exaggerated myth about the past and the everyday reality of white South Africans: “South Africa is a deeply misunderstood country, and Musk’s statements thicken the clouds of misconceptions that swirl around him,” wrote Fairbanks .