The South African President has made an offer of his country’s rare earth minerals to the US during his heated meeting with President Donald Trump on Wednesday in Washington DC.

President Cyril Ramaphosa told Trump that his country has the minerals which the US needs to fuel its vast economy, but he did not name the minerals.

Ramaphosa was in Washington DC to meet with Trump and his key inner circle in a bid to reset the relationship between the two countries following a fallout.

The offer was made during the opening remarks by the two leaders before the meeting got heated and Trump made false claims of white farmers being violently evicted from their farms and later “executed” by unknown people.

“Our links are really long lasting and we would like to recalibrate those relations between our two countries and discuss a whole range of issues, geo political, the work that you are doing to be increased around the world, Ukraine and the Middle East. So, we value that and we are also a great contributor to peace processes that are going on around the world.

“And of course we want to discuss how we can support each other. You are a much bigger economy, we are just a tiny economy, but we rely on each other on a number of issues. We have got critical minerals that you want to fuel the growth of your own economy to industrialize. So, we have that on offer, including rare earth minerals,” Ramaphosa said to Trump.

The US has already inked deals on rare earth minerals with Ukraine and Rwanda. The DR Congo recently made an offer to the US in exchange for stabilising the eastern part which is war torn.