Julius Malema has been suspended from the ANC Youth League for five years and has to vacate his position as president of the organisation.
The ANC’s national disciplinary committee found him guilty of provoking serious divisions in the ANC and bringing the organisation into disrepute, committee chairman Derek Hanekom said yesterday.
The youth league’s “arrogant” spokesman Floyd Shivambu was suspended for three years.
Secretary-general Sindiso Magaqa was found guilty of making a derogatory statement about Public Enterprises Minister Malusi Gigaba.
He was suspended for 18 months. The sentence was suspended for three years.
On a charge of disrupting an ANC meeting on August 8, 2011, Malema, Magaqa, youth league deputy president Ronald Lamola, treasurer-general Pule Mabe and deputy secretary general Kenetswe Mosenogi were found guilty.
The youth league memberships of the five were suspended for two years. This sanction was suspended for three years.
The punishment would come into effect after the appeal process had been concluded. All of them would continue to receive their salaries until then.
Elaborating on the charges, Hanekom said Malema, at a youth league meeting on July 31, hinted that then-president Thabo Mbeki had opposed attempts to recolonise Africa, unlike President Jacob Zuma’s administration.
“However, the suggestion that the administrations after comrade Mbeki have relegated or abandoned an African agenda and thereby aided and abetted the imperialist agenda that seeks to recolonise Africa is untrue and portrays the current ANC government and the leadership under President Zuma in a negative light and therefore has the potential to sow division and disunity,” Hanekom said, reading from a statement.
Malema was further found guilty of making statements about the league’s helping to bring about regime change in Botswana.
This “careless” utterance had brought the ANC into disrepute in and outside South Africa, said Hanekom.
Malema was found not guilty of “sowing racism” through statements made at a rally on May 9 in Galeshewe, Kimberley. “Discipline is a core attribute of any leadership and the ANC would have expected (Malema) to have led by example.”
The national disciplinary noted that, in 18 months, Malema had been found guilty on four counts of sowing division in the ANC, bringing the party into disrepute and defying its officials.
Shivambu was found guilty on two charges – swearing at a journalist and his press statement about regime change in Botswana. The ANC’s national disciplinary committee noted his “arrogance and defiance”.
The committee rejected his defence that he had been provoked into swearing at Media24 journalist Jacques Dommisse by being called a fool.
It said Shivambu was the face of the organisation. His use of vulgar language was “unacceptable and constitutes a serious offence”.
The ANC national chairwoman, Baleka Mbete, who sat on the disciplinary committee, testified that she could not remember when the ANC had condoned such language.
Shivambu’s statement that the youth league had a programme of “liberating the people of Botswana from imperialist dominance” severely prejudiced the ANC, eroded its international relations and could spook investors.
“(Shivambu’s) reckless conduct not only attracted liability to himself, but also put the country at risk.”
The committee found that any message from the league could then be perceived to be representing the views of the ANC and the South African government.
Magaqa’s statement issued on behalf of the league on August 2 this year had been derogatory and an unjustified attack on Gigaba.
Magaqa was ordered to apologise publicly to Gigaba within five days.
On the charge of disrupting a meeting of top ANC officials, the committee found it was “unprecedented, and untenable” to barge uninvited into a meeting that included Zuma and his deputy, Kgalema Motlanthe.
While the committee understood the group might have “harboured feelings of frustration”, ill-discipline was not a cure for this.
“The (committee) took the view that the respondents, as ANC members and senior leaders of the ANC Youth League, are expected to shine as beacons of the values of the ANC, and set an example to the millions of young people in South Africa, both black and white.”
Four hearings were held between August 30 and November 6. The national disciplinary committee’s findings run to 136 pages. – Sapa