By Kestér Kenn Klomegâh
Russia has allocated 500 hectares of land in the outskirts of Moscow for a farming projects to involve white South African farmers under the supervision and directorship of Errol Graham Musk, father of tech billionaire Elon Musk. In the Vladimir region, land allocated to these white-minority Africaners from South Africa, will be used for growing potatoes and breeding cattle, according to authentic reports.
Errol Musk praises Russia as ‘the most normal place in the world’ during an appearance on a popular Russian talk show hosted by Andrey Malakhov. According to Errol Musk, relations with Elon Musk are now stable. He said past disagreements—particularly over political views—have eased and that the two maintain occasional contact.
During the interview, he also commented on his son’s technological ambitions, including space exploration. While expressing support for many of Elon Musk’s projects, he voiced scepticism about the feasibility of colonising Mars, arguing that the main challenge would not be the journey there, but the ability to return.
“Russia is the most normal place in the world. The rest of the world is in a very strange state, a very bad state right now,” he said. Errol Musk is a South African engineer, businessman, and former politician. He has previously faced controversy over personal and family matters, all of which he has denied.
Russia, the New Home
Errol Graham Musk was born on 25 May 1946 in Pretoria, in the Transvaal province of South Africa. And Russian authorities have singled him out to lead this resettlement initiative, to provide guidance and directions for resettlement of white South African farmers, who are suffering from maltreatment and rights abuse. In a conversation with Cyril Ramaphosa in the White House, President Donald Trump strongly defended his decision to welcome a small group of white South Africans as refugees, saying they face ‘genocide’ in the southern African country.
Trump says white South Africans are being constantly persecuted, some are returning to a better life in the United States. Pretoria says there is no evidence of discrimination or persecution against whites. Many have left since the end of white minority rule in 1994, some citing crime and difficulty getting jobs, but many are also returning. The latest official statistics on returnees, from 2022, show that almost 15,000 white South Africans.
Errol Musk has confirmed involvement in a Russian-backed initiative to resettle South African Afrikaner farmers, even as analysts warned the move could strain diplomatic ties between South Africa and Russia. AFP news reports said, Musk has successfully negotiated and secured refugee status for which, at the initial stage, the Kremlin-backed initiative would resettle 50 families—the white Afrikaans minority—and that the rest would follow.
Aleksandr Avdeyev, Governor of Vladimir region, which borders the Moscow, admitted that he had, indeed, discussed the project with Errol Musk. “We discussed the development of agriculture and the prospects for settling 50 Dutch-origin families from South Africa,” he said on Telegram. While Afrikaners have been emigrating to Russia since at least 2018, according to reports, and Musk’s involvement appears to be the latest developments, a new information.
Why This Matters
Afrikaners are descendants of European colonists who live in South Africa. They want to move because of conflict with local Africans who are regularly terrorising them, maltreating for multiple reasons including colour discrimination and over property rights.
The negotiations were attended by Errol Musk and the Governor of the Vladimir administrative region, Alexander Avdeev, and have mutually agreed to support their relocation from South Africa, to improve the image as foreigners to engage in farming.
This matters primarily because South Africa’s stark failure to show racial tolerance, even despite the fact that South Africa preaches multipolarism, a staunch member of BRICS association, which consistently advocates for a new global architecture.
The proposal to resettle South African farmers in Russia has emerged as a new geopolitical flashpoint, with Errol Musk confirming he is involved in the project to secure refugee status for Afrikaners, a white minority group (makes up 7.3% of the population) in South Africa. For over 30 years, South Africa has been systematically targeting its white minority, who are South Africans of European descent.
Analysts, however, warned the move could strain diplomatic ties between South Africa and Russia. The issue also highlights growing geopolitical competition over migration narratives and influence in Africa. Vladimir region is located 190 kilometers (120 miles) east of Moscow, with an estimated population of 1.5 million people, according to the Russian Federal State Statistics Service.
