Malema warns of occupation
EFF’s empowerment tactics move a gear up
EFF leader Julius Malema said business, starting with Absa, must prepare for the occupation of their premises next year as the party moved to force the hand of employers to empower their workers instead of individual black economic empowerment (BEE) beneficiaries.
Addressing the German Chamber of Commerce at the Johannesburg Country Club in Auckland Park, Malema said business needed to submit plans on how black workers in particular would be empowered through owning a stake in the entities they worked for.
Malema though assured employers that the 51 percent stake the party was punting for workers would be negotiable. But he said BEE was no longer relevant as it benefited only connected individuals.
“It is coming to you! It is coming to you! we will be closing down the production day of Absa,” Malema told a group of company executives including those of Mercedes Benz, Siemens, Norton Rose Fulbright, Moore Stephens, WerthSchröder and Snooks Estates.
“We are starting with Absa next year, we will not tell you the time and date, you will just see a lot of people walking into your business and the security will let them pass thinking business is good that day, 3 000 fighters will go into the bank and then sit in until you tell us how you plan to empower your workers,” Malema said, naming FNB as second on the list.
This is the second time Malema was given the podium by a foreign business chamber. His first was with the American Chamber of Business in September, where he made clear that the EFF would nationalise land and mines.
Good reception
On Tuesday Malema leaves for the UK for speaking engagements where he is expected to engage with academics, business people, activists and progressive formations.
Malema’s direct speak, threats and cajoling to business appeared to go rather well, with several questions and redirects made by the business people seeking clarity and sometimes warning that Marxist leanings were not relevant.
There appeared to be consensus from business voicing out exasperation with the empowerment vehicle, which has created some notable billionaires and millionaires.
“There will be an unled revolution in this country but if you have empowered your workers you have nothing to fear, they will protect you, you will be protected in the coming revolution,” he said.
There were some flinches when Malema attacked the lifestyle of business executives, whom he said paid their workers peanuts but their dogs and pets had medical aid cover while workers and black children ate at rubbish dumps.
“You say we are angry, wouldn’t you be angry to see children at Lonmin eating from rubbish dumps,” he challenged.
He contested the warnings of those who said the EFF would scare off investors and lead to disinvestments with its policies seeking to carve a large stake for workers in owning the business they worked at.
“You are investing in yourselves, not in us, that is why the EFF is able to gather 50 000 people on a Tuesday and march 27 kilometres with them. They have nothing to do, they are idling and are tired. Some of your workers took leave to march because they do not value those jobs that give them peanuts,” Malema scolded.
The EFF last month took its fight to the JSE and banks to press for empowerment.
Malema said there were some companies in the JSE who had rallied to the call to adopt schools and were coming to the party for discussions on how to make that possible. ANALYSTS and experts expect slow growth for Telecel Zimbabwe – the country’s secondlargest cellular operator – after the government bought out VimpelCom’s 60 percent stake in the firm, amid concerns that the government is to merge Telecel with its other wholly owned operator, NetOne, to raise competition for Strive Masiyiwa’s Econet Wireless.
Telecel Zimbabwe, NetOne and Econet Wireless are the only cellular operators in Zimbabwe, with the government also owning TelOne, the sole fixed-phone operator in the southern African country.
Telecommunications is apparently lucrative for the government, with telecom companies being levied taxes on airtime top-ups and on all mobile money transactions.
Experts said Telecel Zimbabwe would be weaker after the exit of VimpelCom and the entrance of the cash-strapped Zimbabwe government as new majority shareholder.
Information also showed that the government was keen to take up majority control of the company although it could face resistance from minority shareholders under the Empowerment Corporation which controls 40 percent of Telecel Zimbabwe.
“One could expect limited growth for Telecel as a result of a lack of government funding in Zimbabwe. Investment into the company will also be limited, thereby limiting growth possibilities,” said Anesu Charamba, the ICT team leader for Africa at research and advisory firm, Frost and Sullivan. The government paid $40 million (R556m) for the 60 percent.
MTN fine
The move by global operator, VimpelCom to dispose of its stake in the Zimbabwean operator comes a few months after the government accused it of failing to pay licence renewal fees and to comply with the indigenisation policy.
Regulatory compliance issues have hogged the limelight this week after MTN was fined $5.2 billion in Nigeria and slapped with another $620 000 for alleged anti-competitive practices in Uganda.
Telecel Zimbabwe has just below 3 million subscribers in a market that is nearing mobile saturation. Econet has about 9 million subscribers while NetOne says it has 3 million, although there has been debate over these figures, with experts saying active subscriber numbers may be much lower on the three networks, with multiple sim-card holders also distorting subscriber numbers. Zimbabwe ICT (Information and Communications Technology) Minister Supa Mandiwanzira has shot down the idea that the government planned to merge NetOne and Telecel. However, engineers in the sector said this was a possibility.