Elon Musk is reconnecting with his country of birth. In recent weeks, he has rustled up a global right-wing panic over South Africa’s land ownership laws and affirmative action policies, culminating in Donald Trump issuing an executive order ending US financial assistance to South Africa and welcoming ethnic Afrikaners, who are supposedly “victims of unjust racial discrimination,” to resettle in the United States. Musk’s claims have found traction with right-wing Afrikaner nationalist groups, who have spent years stoking paranoia that white South Africans are an embattled minority facing persecution.

This whole debacle is absurd and divorced from reality. First, the impugned law — the Expropriation Act — signed by South African president Cyril Ramaphosa in late January, does not give the state carte blanche to seize property without compensation. It only allows for the possibility of “nil compensation” in specific and limited circumstances, particularly when land is expropriated in the public interest. This may apply to unused land, properties without development plans or profit, or properties posing a community risk.

The Expropriation Act aims to rectify injustices in South Africa’s land ownership by replacing outdated apartheid-era laws with a framework that prioritizes public interest over private privilege. Rooted in constitutional principles, it moves away from the “willing seller, willing buyer” model, which historically protected white landowners, and instead ensures expropriation occurs with just and equitable compensation. Contrary to claims that it allows land seizures without payment, the act follows a long-standing global legal tradition permitting states to use property for public benefit.