JOHANNESBURG, Nov 23 — South Africa will not symbolically pass the rotating G20 presidency to the United States (US), said President Cyril Ramaphosa's spokesman during the summit on Sunday.
The German News Agency reported that under normal protocol, the outgoing host formally hands over the chair at the end of the summit to the next presidency holder — in this case, the US. But Washington is boycotting the first G20 summit ever held on African soil.
Its President Donald Trump has accused South Africa of discriminating against white minorities, particularly Afrikaners, descendants of Dutch settlers. South Africa rejects the allegations as unfounded, and rights experts have also dismissed them as unjustified.
Because of the boycott, the US is not taking part in any of the summit discussions.
According to presidential spokesman Vincent Magwenya, Washington had planned to send an embassy representative to the summit just for Sunday’s handover ceremony, which he said was unacceptable to South Africa.
“It is a breach of protocol. It has never happened before, and it was never going to happen for the first time here in South Africa," Magwenya said on Saturday.
Later on Saturday, South African Foreign Minister Ronald Lamola said the handover will take place next week in the capital Pretoria, with the US Embassy's head participating.
South Africa is hosting the two-day meeting in Johannesburg, its commercial hub. The G20 comprises 19 countries, the European Union, and the African Union. Next year’s summit is scheduled to take place in Miami, the US.
