Zambia and South Africa in spat over off-colour colonialism remarks Zambian Vice-President Guy Scott. Photograph: Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi/AP South Africa has summoned Zambia's high commissioner to explain a tirade by the country's vice-president in which he castigated South Africans for being backward. In an unusually frank interview in the Guardian on Wednesday, Guy Scott said: "The South Africans are very backward in terms of historical development. I hate South Africans. That's not a fair thing to say because I like a lot of South Africans but they really think they're the bee's knees and actually they've been the cause of so much trouble in this part of the world. The comments ruffled feathers on social media and appeared to threaten otherwise cordial relations between the former liberation struggle allies. On Thursday , South Africa's international relations department said it would raise concern about Scott's negative remarks. "In view of this development, the South African government has decided to take the matter up through the appropriate diplomatic channels," spokesman Clayson Monyela said. Accordingly, we shall be summoning the high commissioner of Zambia to South Africa to the department of international relations and co-operation to seek an explanation behind the remarks and what it means in the context of our bilateral relations. During the interview in Lusaka, Scott mocked South Africa's membership of the Brics developing economies, compared President Jacob Zuma with FW de Klerk and opined: "I have a suspicion the blacks model themselves on the whites now that they're in power. 'Don't you know who we are, man?' He also defended the Zimbabwean president, Robert Mugabe, and spoke out against Zuma's attempts to mediate in that country on behalf of the Southern African Development Community. Recalling a meeting between Mugabe and the Zambian president, Michael Sata, Scott said: "Michael the other day was saying, 'You have to get this thing sorted out among yourself, you don't want to go to Sadc - it's a new kind of colonialism'." His outburst triggered debate in South Africa about how it is seen by the rest of the continent. Writing in the Daily Maverick, Simon Allison admitted: "Much as I want to be offended, my inclination to argue with Scott is tempered by the fact that I've said nearly the exact same thing myself. 'The rest of Africa doesn't like us very much,' I wrote in an analysis last year. He added: "It will be interesting to see how our top politicians react to Scott's frank, if insulting, assessment - which, like all the best insults, is just a little too close to the bone for comfort." Ferial Haffajee, editor of South Africa's City Press newspaper, tweeted: "I'm sorry, Guy Scott comes across as a jealous git with terrible gender politics."