The government has started urgent discussions with various local and global funding organisations in a bid to raise money to address a budget shortfall in its anti-HIV treatment programme.

This comes after US President Donald Trump halted close to $440m in funding for South Africa’s ARV treatment programme, cutting that aid from the US President's Emergency Plan For Aids Relief (PEPFAR), set up by then president George W Bush.

The withdrawal of funding directly placed the jobs of at least 15,000 health workers at risk while there are concerns that it could also result in the total collapse of the ARV treatment programme.

Addressing MPs during a debate on the matter, which was sponsored by EFF leader Julius Malema, health minister Aaron Motsoaledi said funding talks have started in earnest with philanthropy and prominent domestic and international foundations to close the hole in its anti-HIV budget.

“In the meantime, we have met many funders, the Clinton Health Access Initiative, the Elmar Foundation, the Gates Foundation, the Foreign and Commonwealth Development Office of the UK, our own FirstRand, the trustees of the Solidarity Fund — not the Solidarity that ran to Trump but the Solidarity Fund established during Covid,” said Motsoaledi.

“I want to emphasise to you that there’s no government or funder in the world that has put money aside waiting for Trump to explode. That’s why we’re meeting them but none of them (are yet saying) we’re giving you this much. Trump does not owe us a cent.”

Motsoaledi, who is a strong proponent of the National Health Insurance scheme, said the moment also called for a review of subsidised private medical schemes, whose members claimed billions in tax rebates from Sars.

“I am challenging this house to come and debate in this house, why, all of us in this house, including all well-to-do South Africans, why are we still getting heavy subsidies to stay on private medical aid? Is it favour, should we be doing that in this difficult time,” asked Motsoaledi.

In a speech before Motsoaledi spoke, Malema argued that Trump’s immediate halting of PEPFAR was to punish South Africa over its stance against Israel and its decision to charge that country at the International Court of Justice.

The EFF said Trump was penalising Pretoria for its enactment of the Expropriation Act, which among others allows for expropriation of land in the public interest.

Malema said parties in parliament, and the country at large, needed to unite and push back against Trump’s “bullying tactics”.

“This government refuses to acknowledge the real issue: we are being punished for supporting Palestine against apartheid Israel, nothing else.

“The US does not believe there is white genocide or land grabs in South Africa. These lies are useful tools to justify economic aggression and seek to weaken our moral authority to condemn Israel's genocide.

“Foreign aid has always been a tool of Western imperialism and control; it must end with South Africa. We must expand our trade and strengthen relations with China, India, Russia, Brazil and Singapore while emphasising African unity.

“The US is on a fool’s mission to extort the world into submission and as a result will become increasingly isolated.”

In his second bite in the debate, which is allowed in term of parliamentary conventions, Malema said he welcomed the alternative funding options Motsoaledi was pursuing.

“America did not save us during apartheid. Children were murdered in 1976, in the 80s. Where was America against apartheid? If America had done anything to save an African life, it’s a lie. They never wanted to save us, they were never there for us before. Palestine was there for us, Cuba was there for us, Russia was there for us. America will never choose friends for us, will choose our friends.”