What is the background to Jamaica’s connection with South Africa?
Jamaica’s historical bond with Africa dates to the early sixteenth century, when the Spanish, who had begun settling the island in 1509, brought the first enslaved Africans to its shores. The trade intensified after the English captured Jamaica in 1655 and transported enslaved Africans to the island in ever greater numbers. Most came from West and Central Africa, particularly present-day Ghana and the regions known as the Bight of Benin and the Bight of Biafra. The territory we know today as South Africa was not a direct point of embarkation for the transatlantic trade.
Some 90 per cent of Jamaicans are descended from enslaved Africans, and that shared heritage has created a bond of friendship with peoples across the continent, whatever their country of origin. Nowhere was this more evident than during the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, and the bond was further strengthened when Nelson Mandela visited Jamaica shortly after his release from prison.
Formal diplomatic relations between the two countries were established on 9 September 1994. Jamaica opened its High Commission in Pretoria in October 2006 and, in 2009, appointed His Excellency Audley Rodriques as its first resident High Commissioner. The current High Commissioner, Her Excellency Joan Thomas-Edwards, presented her credentials in 2023.
Who are some of the Jamaican political leaders who have visited South Africa?
The Most Honourable Andrew Holness, Prime Minister of Jamaica, made an official visit from 20 to 24 November 2025. The main purpose of the visit was to strengthen bilateral ties and deepen cultural connections between the two nations.
The Honourable Olivia Grange, Minister of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sport, has also visited.
Which reggae musicians have visited South Africa?
Bob Marley never performed in South Africa during the apartheid era, but his music became a powerful weapon against the regime. In 1979, he performed at the Amandla Festival in Boston in support of South Africa’s freedom fighters.
The Marley family has since carried that legacy to South African soil. In 2025, Ziggy Marley, YG Marley and his mother, Lauryn Hill, headlined the DStv Delicious International Food and Music Festival. Other Jamaican artistes who have performed in the country include Marcia Griffiths, Freddie McGregor, Beres Hammond and Johnny Osbourne.
Peter Tosh, although he never visited, was posthumously honoured for his anti-apartheid activism with the Order of the Companions of O.R. Tambo, one of South Africa’s highest national honours for foreign nationals who supported the struggle against apartheid. His song “Jah Is My Keeper” was performed at Canterbury Cathedral in 2019 at the consecration of Jamaican-born Bishop Rose Hudson-Wilkin, the first Black woman to become a bishop in the Church of England.
Jimmy Cliff, in 1980, defied the United Nations cultural boycott to perform in South Africa, drawing massive audiences in Durban and Cape Town. He will be remembered for classics such as “Many Rivers to Cross” and “The Harder They Come”.
Sizzla Kalonji, born Miguel Orlando Collins, performed in Johannesburg in 2010, 2014, 2015 and 2016, drawing thousands to his concerts.
Which Jamaican folk singer and religious leader have visited South Africa?
Harry Belafonte, the Jamaican-American singer, was a committed opponent of apartheid and was instrumental in organising the 1988 concert at Wembley Stadium marking Nelson Mandela’s 70th birthday. After 1994, he visited South Africa often, working alongside Mandela on humanitarian causes.
The Reverend Dr Devon Dick, pastor of the Boulevard Baptist Church in Kingston, is a former president of the Jamaica Baptist Union and a published author whose works include Rebellion to Riot. He has visited South Africa twice: first on a short trip to Soweto, and again in 2015 for a Baptist World Alliance conference. During that visit he toured Robben Island and met the daughter of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, who was representing her father while he was unwell.
Rev Dick says he will never forget Marco Cianfanelli’s sculpture marking the site of Nelson Mandela’s 1962 arrest. He also treasures the memory of being a guest at a breakfast held in Mandela’s honour during the late president’s visit to Jamaica.
