Julius Malema: If ANC wants EFF support in Joburg, they must hand over Ekurhuleni

Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema says if the African National Congress (ANC) wants his party’s support in the City of Johannesburg, it must first rectify the mistake it made in Ekurhuleni.

Speaking to Newzroom Afrika on Thursday, Malema slammed the party’s lack of communication following their disagreement on who would be voted in as mayor, which resulted in DA’s Tania Campbell’s return to her position.

Malema said the EFF was willing to talk to the ANC, on condition that they fix what happened in Ekurhuleni.

“The voter said I want to see how best you can cooperate and work together and that means sharing of power. I don’t understand where the arrogance of the ANC and DA comes from. We never said we can’t negotiate with the DA, they don’t want to talk to us because they think they lost the votes of racists on the basis that they worked with EFF, but the racists are leaving them either way,” said Malema.

Malema vs SAHRC

Responding to the South African Human Rights Commission’s (SAHRC) notice for an apology over his “hateful statements” made during the party’s Provincial People’s Assembly in the Western Cape, Malema said he was ready to go to court.

Last month, the EFF leader said the party’s members and supporters should “never be scared to kill” in defence of the red berets’ agenda for the economic emancipation of black people.

“You must never be scared to kill. A revolution demands that, at some point, there must be killing because the killing is part of a revolutionary act,” Malema told party delegates attending the conference.

“The founding manifesto of the EFF says we’ll take power by all means necessary. And therefore, revolutionaries when confronted by that situation should never think twice. Cowards are not for the revolution.

“The EFF must be known that it’s not a playground for racists. Any racists that plays next to the EFF and threaten to beat up the membership and the leadership of the EFF that is an application to meet your maker with immediate effect,” he said.

The commission said on Wednesday in its report into the incident following complaints: “The commission is of the view that certain parts of Mr Malema’s speech and some of the posters/banners displayed at the event [on 16 October] as set out above prima facie, individually and collectively, constitute incitement of violence, hate speech and possibly other transgressions.

“If they (Malema and EFF) do not, within ten days hereof, appropriately retract and apologise for the prima facie unlawful statements in question and give appropriate undertakings to desist from further promotion of hatred and violence on any ground, the commission will proceed to the Equality Court for appropriate interim interdictory relief.”

But the EFF leader has accused the commission of not being neutral in the matter.

“How do you, as a neutral body, just make a decision without talking to the other side? They never said to me ‘we received this complaint about you, what is your explanation?’ All I hear is that ‘retract this statement in the next 10 days or else we’re going to court’. So you can see there’s no neutrality,” said the EFF leader.

“They say there was display of posters at the EFF people’s assembly in the western cape. Those posters, you will know, are from the 2013 launch of the EFF in Marikana, so someone went to remanufacture those posters and sent them to the SAHRC. It doesn’t even do an investigation on basic things that those things EFF distances itself from those posters which were displayed in Marikana. Now the commission says they were displayed in the Western Cape. If they had asked for an explanation from the EFF before coming into this determination, we would have given them information that this is wrong and it’s from 2013 and the EFF is on record distancing itself from this. This is the context within which those things you’re saying are an incitement were made and therefore do not constitute any incitement.

“I’m not going to apologize in ten days, rather they take me to court, we have no problem with going to court.”