As the largest city in South Africa prepares to welcome the heads of state of the world’s 20 wealthiest economies, a wide range of the nation’s citizens want to use the meeting to make their own voices heard.
Along a highway into the city, Johannesburg, an enormous orange banner appeared that was put up by members of the white Afrikaner minority: “Welcome to the most race-regulated country in the world,” it said, echoing claims made recently by President Trump.
Nearby, a group promoting women’s rights raised a very different billboard, featuring an image of a purple and black coffin: “Welcome to the country where women are only safe in a casket,” it said, referring to the staggering number of women who have been abused or murdered in the country.
Several groups, from frustrated college students to anti-immigration activists, are planning to hold protests and work stoppages this weekend, when Johannesburg hosts the first Group of 20 summit to be held in Africa.
While most South Africans have viewed Mr. Trump’s false claims of a white genocide in South Africa as an effort to sully their country’s image, they have had no qualms about seizing on the summit as a chance to air their domestic grievances.
Many locals are vying to tell the arriving guests — and by extension, their own leaders — everything they believe is wrong with South Africa.
“The government is not paying enough attention,” said Sabrina Walter, the founder and executive director of Women for Change, which put up the billboard with the coffin. The group has also called on women and members of the L.G.B.T.Q. community to refuse to work or spend money when the heads of state are in town. “We have delegates from all over the world,” Ms. Walter said. “We need to get as much attention on this issue as possible now.”
For many South Africans, the summit is a source of pride, a recognition of their country’s status as the largest economy on the continent. But the nation is also among the world’s most unequal, struggling with high unemployment and crime and an inability to provide most of its more than 60 million citizens with necessities like water and electricity.
The protests have agitated government leaders, who hope to use the summit to showcase their country and promote the needs of Africa and developing nations on a global stage. The government has spent heavily to give Johannesburg a face lift, cleaning up trash-filled streets, filling in potholes and fixing broken streetlights.
But the expensive effort has stirred resentment among some locals, who wonder why their government cannot keep the city so clean and functional all the time. G20 signage and street and traffic lights along the route to the summit’s site have been vandalized, prompting local officials to vow to prosecute those responsible.
“It’s a deliberate and malicious campaign of sabotage, designed to undermine and tarnish the image of our province and country as we prepare to welcome global leaders,” Elijah Mhlanga, a government spokesman for the province that includes Johannesburg, said.
For some, the summit presents an ideal opportunity to make themselves heard.
Ms. Walter said her group was calling for the work stoppage to protest what it called the government’s failure to prevent violence against women and girls in South Africa, where an average of 118 rapes are reported each day. Her group wants the government to declare gender-based violence and killings a national disaster.
The Solidarity Movement, a network of organizations representing Afrikaners, the descendants of European colonizers, put up the highway banner claiming discrimination. While their cause has been supported by Mr. Trump, it drew a severe backlash from the provincial government, which had the sign removed.
The group seeks to “hold up a mirror to the world of South Africa’s racial policy,” said Dirk Hermann, the chief executive of Solidarity.
Not everyone is so well organized. As the summit approached, college students were still trying to plan a protest near the G20 site.
Thabisa Moloi, an unemployed university graduate from Soweto, said young people want to show their anger at political leaders, who they say live in comfort while young South Africans cannot find jobs. With youth unemployment at about 46 percent, Ms. Moloi wants to use the summit to press her government to do more.
“We are the victims of corruption,” she said. “We will be seen and felt.”
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