DURBAN, January 8 (ANA) – The African National Congress is imploding and has to “bus in supporters” from Mpumalanga and KwaZulu-Natal to hold a successful rally in Gauteng, Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema said on Sunday.
Speaking at Westville Prison in Durban after visiting the sole remaining #FeesMustFall student still in custody, Malema referred to the ANC’s 105th birthday rally at Orlando Stadium in Soweto, Johannesburg, and said 100 buses had ferried supporters from KwaZulu-Natal to the stadium.
“Gauteng is gone. The arrival of EFF has removed them from FNB [Stadium].” A growing party did not need to bus in supporters and did not choose a smaller stadium over a bigger venue. The EFF had never bused in supporters from another province, because the party did not have the money to do so.
He predicted that the ANC’s next birthday rally would be held at the King Zwelithini Stadium in Umlazi, which only has the capacity to seat 10,000 people.
Malema arrived mid-morning to visit Bonginkosi Khanyile, a Durban University of Technology student awaiting trial for allegedly using a slingshot at a #FeesMustFall protest last September. Hundreds of EFF supporters waited outside the entrance as a large police contingent kept watch.
Khanyile was denied bail before Christmas after it emerged that he was already out on bail for a student protest that happened in February. A subsequent appeal to the High Court was also unsuccessful. EFF supporters outside Westville Prison on Sunday carried placards calling for him to be freed.
Malema said Khanyile was being detained to “make [President Jacob] Zuma happy” and the EFF had engaged the best lawyers possible to get Khanyile out of jail.
“He is a hero in our eyes. They have not arrested him. They have arrested the cause of free education.” He said Khanyile was striving for education for all, as was the EFF. “We don’t want to be like Zuma. We don’t want to be like Zuma’s family. We want to be educated,” he said in a referrence to Zuma’s lack of formal education.
Malema dismissed allegations that the EFF had given its vote to the Democratic Alliance and the Inkatha Freedom Party. “We will never give the ANC our vote. We didn’t give the DA our vote. We didn’t give the IFP our vote. We removed the ANC,” he said.
Following the August 3 local government elections the EFF emerged as a power broker in a number of municipalities.
Malema said the accusation that the EFF was pandering to white neo-liberals was a lie. “You must ask yourself the question: Where is the National Party. It is in the ANC.” The National Party’s last leader Marthinus van Schalkwyk was a member of the ANC government’s Cabinet. “We are not friends with the DA but tactics are very important,” he said.
– African News Agency (ANA)
