Billionaire Elon Musk's father is working on a project to grant refugee status to South African farmers in Russia, he told AFP on Tuesday, in an initiative similar to one by the United States government.
The initiative would resettle 50 families from the white Afrikaner minority, descendants of the first Dutch settlers, according to a Russian official.
The same group of South Africans also received offers of refugee status from US President Donald Trump's government, which falsely claimed they were being persecuted by post-apartheid authorities.
Nearly 5,000 white Afrikaners have entered the United States as refugees since Trump took office last January, while refugee programs have been nearly suspended for all other groups.
The US program has angered the South African government, which denies allegations of discrimination.
Errol Musk, who frequently visits Russia and attended the Orthodox Easter service in Moscow on April 12 in the presence of President Vladimir Putin, did not provide details about the project.
In an interview with the Russian publication Gubernia 33, he justified the initiative by claiming that white Afrikaner farmers would be targeted for murder, allegations strongly denied in South Africa.
The governor of Vladimir Oblast, which borders Moscow Oblast, Aleksandr Avdeyev, said last week that he had discussed the project with Musk.
“We discussed the development of agriculture and the prospects of settling 50 families of Dutch origin in South Africa,” he said on Telegram.
Although Afrikaners have been immigrating to Russia since at least 2018, according to reports, Musk's involvement appears to be new information.
Now nearing the end of his eighth decade of life, he is a controversial figure. In an interview with CNN late last year, he rejected the idea that there was racial oppression during apartheid, a system of segregation that deprived the black majority of basic rights.
Elon Musk, who left South Africa in his late teens, frequently accuses the government of racism, including over the refusal to license his internet provider, Starlink.
In a further reaction on social media this weekend, he wrote: “South Africa doesn't allow Starlink licensing even though I WAS BORN THERE, just because I'm not black!”
South African laws designed to correct apartheid-era discrimination require large companies to be at least 30 percent owned by people from previously disadvantaged communities.
Elon Musk's claims are “lies and misinformation”, President Cyril Ramaphosa's spokesperson reacted on the X platform.
