Mohamed Ameen Dabhelia- 2016/06/08

The Afro-Middle East Centre says while reports have emerged that claims about a terror alert in South Africa issued by the United States Embassy were made by an East African businessman living in South Africa, facts should not be ignored.

The US government warned citizens of a possible terrorist attack targeting American expats and tourists in the country followed by Britain and Australia who also issued travel alerts for their citizens visiting the country.

A source with access to South African intelligence told Times Live that the businessman was believed to be a “discredited” informer who was only after the money he’d be paid for the information.

Executive Director of the Afro-Middle East Centre, Na’eem Jeenah says when Americans issue such warnings, there is always some meaning or agenda behind it.

“If you remember last year September, which was the last time they issued such a warning, now this was five or six days before a group of South Africans who went to Raqqa to join the Islamic State and returned to the country.”

Jeena says that according to the US the South African government has not been cooperative on the war on terror and issued the warning informing them of joining the programme.

The previous warning came in 2009 when the Americans closed down the embassy and consulate offices for a few days, however Jeena says nothing came of this.

He says the US’ statement relates to the latest terror threat with the warning not even mentioned at the travel advisory on the state department’s website.

“This means that the state department is not saying to people who want to travel to South Africa or Americans who want to travel to South Africa that there’s any warning.”

Jeena says that that in 2010 there was a campaign promoted by academics and journalists to convince South Africans that the FIFA Soccer World Cup was going to be an Al Qaeda target.

“To my memory, for the first time ever, Al Qaeda actually issued a statement saying we have no intention to target the World Cup, now the point of coming out with a statement like that is making a strong comment.”

He says this doesn’t mean the situation can’t change in a year’s time, in six months, or two weeks time, but right now South Africa is not a target for any operations with any transnational group.

Jeena says that we’ve had two instances of what might be called acts of terrorism since 1994 until now.

“One was PAGAD, and the other was the Boeremag, both of which were local, home grown movements that were to serve local home grown objectives, not transnational objectives and not so-called Islamist objectives.”

Jeenah adds that South Africa could possibly be a target as it might serve as a ground for recruitment and possibly as a ground for fundraising but he doesn’t believe that there’s any reason for any groups to regard South Africa as a target for operations.

Listen to the Podcast with AMEC Executive’s Director Na’eem Jeenah  Here

Twitter: @thedabhelia

(Edited By Faizel Patel)