EFF leadership: five more years for Malema
APHIWE DEKLERK and ZINGISA MVUMVU
Julius Malema will lead the EFF for at least the next five years.
Malema, who founded the party in 2013 after his expulsion from the ANC, was elected unopposed to the position of president late on Saturday night.
His deputy, Floyd Shivambu, was also re-elected — but after a scare when advocate Dali Mpofu was nominated.
However, Mpofu didn’t make the threshold after accepting the nomination.
EFF MPs Marshall Dlamini and Veronica Mente were chosen as secretary-general and national chair respectively, while Poppy Mailola was voted deputy secretary-general and Omphile Maotwe the treasurergeneral.
The EFF confessed that it faced death should Malema be arrested on any of the charges he faces.
Both Malema and Gordrich Gardee who was secretarygeneral until he was replaced by Dlamini made presentation reports to delegates. Malema was the first to warn that the party should have people who were capable to succeed him or risk the organisation dying in a similar manner to how the PAC died after its leader, Robert Sobukwe, was arrested by the apartheid regime.
“When the apartheid regime isolated and banished Robert Sobukwe, it knew that those who remained in the Pan Africanist Congress had no capacity to lead a militant mass organisation that was founded by Robert Sobukwe, irrespective of the progressive ideas of the PAC.
“As a result, the PAC has struggled to exist beyond Robert
The EFF confessed that it faced death should Malema be arrested on any of the charges he faces
Sobukwe,” Malema said.
Gardee was more explicit and referred to the Malema’s legal troubles. “It is clear that there is a coordinated effort to have the CIC [Malema] constantly appearing in court or, worse, behind bars and thus uprooted from the groundwork of building a formidable alternative political movement for the total economic emancipation of our people,” he said.
“The NPA should take important lessons on the history of the PAC and what happened to it following the imprisonment of its leader.
“Should the state one day achieve its arrest of the CIC ... even for a few years, our organisation will draw backward and become what the PAC became once the apartheid state put Robert Sobukwe behind bars.”
So Julius Malema remains head of the EFF and Floyd Shivambu his deputy. The EFF’s conference ends on Monday, after which party resolutions will be announced. However, many would remember the conference not for any leadership contest or policy positions taken, but for the row between the red berets and the media. Daily Maverick, Scorpio, AmaBhungane and Rapport were among the media outfits banned from covering the EFF’s National People’s Assembly. In solidarity eNCA suspended its coverage of the event.
Sadly, the EFF-journalism drama plays out hardly a fortnight after similar behaviour from Cricket SA, which banned several senior sports writers whose reportage had raised its ire. Though the ban was rescinded later the same day, the damage was done. Media is a mirror of society. It boggles the mind why some people try to dismantle the mirror instead of fixing the society.
Our thesis should not be mistaken for an assertion that journalists are saints. For this reason there are mechanisms for recourse if anyone feels aggrieved. The question we should ask is if the reports of these journalists about the EFF have been truthful and fair.
One story that irked EFF was how an investigation of their trash exposed their luxurious lifestyle. The VBS bank scandal also refuses to go away. While the red berets say digging up evidence from their trash bins compromised their security, the bigger picture is that they are conflicted as individuals. They portray themselves as fighting for the poor, yet their extravagance smacks of hypocrisy.
It is not the first time Malema and the EFF have clashed with the media. Last November the EFF allegedly called some media professionals Stratcom spies. In 2010, while leader of the ANC Youth League, Malema swore at a BBC journalist and ordered him out of the press conference.
Clearly the EFF has no tolerance for any plurality of voices. While it says freedom of speech is their hallmark, their actions contradict their words. Their stance is bad for our young democracy. If they were to take state power, media diversity and freedom would be consigned to the dustbin.
We urge the new EFF leadership to resist further attempts to stifle debate and allow for the generation of ideas.
One story that irked EFF was how an investigation of their trash exposed their luxurious lifestyle.