Former South African diplomat, Dr Kingsley Makhubela says nations are well within their rights to decline or expel an ambassador, high commissioner or any diplomat assigned by another state.
The discussion around the expulsion of South Africa's top diplomat in the United States has dominated discourse across South Africa, sparking fears of a further escalation of tensions between Washington and Pretoria, which could jeopardise trade and investment.
In the series of drastic action, IOL has reported that South Africa is this week preparing to receive its former Ambassador to the United States, Ebrahim Rasool, who was expelled by the State Department in Washington last week.
IOL has reported that Rasool was expelled from the USA on Friday, after sharing his opinion on Donald Trump’s presidency during a webinar. The Trump administration expelled Rasool, giving him 72 hours to leave the US.
In a social media post, United States' Secretary of State Marco Rubio called Rasool a "race-baiting politician who hates America" and Trump.
Speaking to the SABC, international relations expert, Makhubela, who previously served as South African ambassador in different countries, said receiving states have the rights to decline a diplomatic candidate deployed or nominated by the sending nation.
"Receiving states, in this case the United States, they have the right to decline that candidate. There has been a few cases in history. If you look at the Vienna Convention, examples they give, for instance in 1891 a senator from the United States was appointed as a minister to China. China refused on the grounds that in the senate (in US) he had made disparaging remarks about China.
"Similarly, I think the recent case is in 1977, Greece refused to accept a candidate from the US because that ambassadorial candidate during the senate hearing, Greece said he made disparaging remarks.
"The latest case was in 2002 in Iran when the United Kingdom appointed a candidate and the Iranians declined, saying this candidate was a spy, a Jewish spy, that is what they said," he said.
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Makhubela added that the receiving state is not under any obligations to provide reasons for declining another country's representative.
"They have the right to be silent, but the conventional wisdom is that people do give limited reasons for whatever decline they opt for," he said.
In Makhubela's view, Rasool was expelled from United States after he uttered "some very offensive words against his host" and not for articulating policies of the South African government.
Chrispin Phiri, spokesperson for Minister of International Relations and Cooperation, Ronald Lamola told broadcaster Newzroom Afrika that Dirco will make a recommendation on the replacement to President Cyril Ramaphosa, before the president applies his mind.
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“The process has started to some extent so that we can make a recommendation to the president (Ramaphosa), internally so the department will attend to the internal issues once the person has been duly nominated. This person will be presented, the name, to the president and of course the president will decide,” he said.
“That will require us to follow the processes of the Foreign Services Act, which can take a life of their own, but that is why we have started in the interim all the administrative processes, so that the other processes with other sister departments are expedited.”
During the Newzroom Afrika interview, Phiri could not be drawn into the discussion on whether a specific individual has already been identified, save to say the internal processes of Dirco had begun.
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