Loudmouth Malema only thrives because there is a dearth of leadership
When it was put to Julius Malema, the self-styled EFF commander-in-chief who has no military experience, that his reckless venture to Senekal could cause a civil war, he exploded: “So be it!” He then launched into a diatribe against leaders he accused of causing what he said was the mess in the country.
It was Colin Powell, I think, who once observed that it’s usually people who had never fought or experienced war who romanticised it, or were eager to send young men to it. Malema has never been to a battlefield. Yet he’s enthralled by war talk. He is what Nelson Mandela called a peacetime hero. He is mining our pathologies for political gain. A leader worth his salt always tries to bring people together, and where there’s conflict will look for peaceful means to resolve it. Malema’s immediate instinct is to take fuel to the fire. He’s always angry, always spoiling for a fight.
Senekal provided him and his party with a precise backdrop and the perfect scapegoats in the form of khaki-clad white farmers.
This was essentially none of his business, but as is so often the case, Malema injects himself into such situations. The white farmers at the magistrate’s court to protest against two black people accused of killing one their own had become violent and overturned and torched a police van. Suddenly everybody got on their high horses. Police minister Bheki Cele, never one to miss a publicity stunt, immediately called for more arrests. Obviously what the farmers did was wrong. An attack on the police is tantamount to an attack on the state. The culprits should have the book thrown at them.
But the government cannot have it both ways. For too long it has looked the other way as angry protesters trashed, looted and burnt buildings with disdain and impunity. In some instances the government has even given the impression of being sympathetic to wrongdoers. The #FeesMustFall protests turned into one long bonfire that went largely unpunished. The ringleaders have gone on to bigger and better things. The burning of a police van by the farmers is a serious crime. But remember the case of Kanya Cekeshe, the #FeesMustFall activist who was sentenced to eight years for setting a police van on fire. The ink had hardly dried on the magistrate’s decision to reject his appeal when justice minister Roland Lamola reached out to his lawyers, offering to help with an application for a presidential pardon. Cekeshe is now a free man, out on parole. Government inconsistency in applying the law encourages such lawlessness. The chickens have come home to roost.
For Malema — another beneficiary of government gutlessness — to say he summoned his so-called “ground forces” to descend on Senekal to defend the judiciary is the height of hypocrisy. The opportunity was just too good to miss. He is Mr Chaos. He thrives on it. That’s what gives him his cachet. As he saw it, Senekal gave him the opportunity not only to be seen to be standing up to the symbol of white power, but also to be on the side of law and order.
Yet only last month he called out his gullible supporters to trash Clicks stores. Attack, he commanded in a tweet, and there was mayhem throughout the country. Steps should immediately have been taken against him for encouraging people to break the law and for the damage to private property. And, as an MP, he should have earned parliament’s wrath for his irresponsible conduct.
None of that happened. Which has only encouraged him to up the stakes. Now he says he won’t mind a civil war — an utterly reckless thing for a lawmaker to say.
The media has unfortunately been among Malema’s enablers. The crowds and colour obviously make for good television. But Malema is a middling politician of average intellect. He holds no official position. What he says or does has no direct impact on the lives of ordinary people. Yet the media is often ready to record every yawn, guffaw or utterance he makes. His press conferences are taken live as though they’re official state events, regardless of what he has to say. When Malema decided to hold a rally outside the Zondo commission two years ago, television cameras immediately switched from covering the commission to take his speech live, and Malema wasn’t saying anything important, only railing against the usual suspects.
Twenty-four-hour TV is a voracious monster. But context matters. Handing the microphone to a politician to rabbit on is not journalism. It’s worth remembering the abominable role played by the media during the genocide in Rwanda.
But a loudmouth like Malema wouldn’t be such a potent figure if there wasn’t the discernible dearth of leadership in the country. He has merely walked into the vacuum. One sometimes gets the impression that President Cyril Ramaphosa regards himself as a technocrat, concerned only with the nuts and bolts of government. SA of course has serious problems that require urgent attention. But he should leave finer details of government to a competent team. Unfortunately he has a cabinet full of deadwood. Ramaphosa should be the leader, not a manager, providing an overarching vision and direction for the country. He should devote his time to talking to our aspirations, hopes and fears, where he intends taking the country and what the role of each one of us is in that journey.
People like Malema should either be rebuked or they should find themselves swimming against the tide of public opinion. Right now their incendiary nonsense tends to gain traction because it is often unchallenged, and therefore given free rein.