A proposal by South Africa’s biggest mining company and other business leaders advising President Cyril Ramaphosa on how to offer the US access to Africa’s critical minerals angered the nation’s mining minister who saw it as an attempt by the firm to advance its own interests.

This city could become a ghost town if one of South Africa’s major steel producers follows through with its threat to close the local steel plant.

U.S. reciprocal tariffs have put an estimated 30,000 jobs at risk, South African authorities said Monday, four days before a 30% U.S. tariff on most imports from South Africa kicks in. South Africa was slapped with one of the highest tariff rates by its third-largest trading partner — after China and the EU — creating uncertainty for the future of some export industries and catapulting a scramble for new markets outside the U.