JOHANNESBURG - The 28th of August marked exactly 100 days before the long awaited G20 Leaders’ Summit set to take place on the 22nd – 23rd of November 2025, in Johannesburg, South Africa.
This momentous event that will be held in Africa for the first time in G20 history, is going to be one of the most critical diplomatic settings of the year for South Africa. Arguably, even more important than President Cyril Ramaphosa’s visit to the United States in March.
However, the biggest question about the event remains unanswered; will the US President, Donald Trump, attend the summit?
READ: Trump says 'probably won't' attend G20 summit in South Africa
For the entirety of South Africa’s presidency of the G20, the US has been sending low-level delegates to the Sherpa & Finance Track meetings. Or just outright refusing to attend. This has been a supposed boycott of South Africa’s internal policies that the US deems as an attack on the country’s Afrikaner population.
US President Donald Trump has indicated that, while his attendance remains uncertain, it remains a possibility still that he will come.
The attendance of the US is of great significance to the G20 as an institution, because President Ramaphosa is supposed to hand over the G20 presidency to Donald Trump, at the conclusion of the 2025 summit.
Should the US refuse to attend, there will be questions of how the members of the G20 must respond. One such question is whether that will be an indication of the US’s intent to withdraw from the group, as it has from other multilateral institutions already.
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Another would be the state of multilateralism and the global financial architecture, without the commitment and cooperation from the world’s largest consumer market,
worth a whopping $28 trillion in GDP.
Needless to say, as the Summit draws nearer, tensions are high, and there are a lot of questions that need to be asked and answered by the South African government as the current leader of the G20.
By: Smangaliso Mkhuma
- Mr Mkhuma holds a MA in Philosophy from Wits University.