Eva.🇿🇦

So, Elon Musk just unilaterally changed the Iran flag emoji shown on his platform. OK?? Black Economic Empowerment aside, having Starlink in South Africa would give Elon Musk control over critical infrastructure and the power to “turn off the lights” or manipulate the flow of information if he disagrees with the government’s stance on a particular issue. And we already know how he feels about South Africa. I mean, following the kidnapping of Nicolas Maduro, Starlink immediately provided free broadband to the country, bypassing local infrastructure entirely. They framed it as humanitarian, but it shows how quickly Musk can pivot to support specific political outcomes. You see, Starlink has kill-switch power. That is, unlike fiber cables in the ground, Starlink is a “top-down” service, meaning SpaceX can geofence or deactivate specific regions at the click of a button from their headquarters in the US. It also has oversight bypass capabilities as Starlink signals go directly from the dish to the satellite, bypassing local Internet Exchange Points. This means the South African government cannot monitor or regulate the traffic for national security purposes as they do with local interest service providers. If rural schools, clinics, and police stations become dependent on Starlink, the South African state loses its policy space. If the government passes a law Musk dislikes, the threat of disconnecting those services becomes a powerful bargaining chip. So, for South Africa, the issue is whether the country is willing to trade national sovereignty for connectivity provided by a man who openly despise the country’s legislative frameworks.