Johannesburg – The Democratic Alliance on Saturday demanded that Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema apologise on live television for “divisive statements” he has made in public.
The EFF is launching its August 3 local government elections manifesto in Orlando Stadium, Soweto, Johannesburg, on Saturday.
Malema, who will deliver the main speech at the EFF rally, is being investigated for high treason after he said during a TV interview that the EFF would, among other things, “take up arms” against the government if the governing African National Congress tried to “rig the elections”.
PICS: Supporters flock to #EFFManifesto launch
DA spokeswoman Phumzile van Damme said on Saturday the EFF was a “radical party that wants white people and black people to hate each other”.
“It is a party that will scare away investment and prevent job creation. It is a party that will – given the opportunity – steal money from the people again. And it is a party that if given the chance would allow for violence and chaos to ensue in our towns and cities all over again,” Van Damme said in a statement.
The reality was that the EFF was too extreme and radical to govern. Like the ANC, the EFF would take South Africa in the wrong direction.
“On behalf of the DA, I today [Saturday] challenge the leader of the Economic Freedom Fighters Julius Malema to use the opportunity of live coverage [of the launch] to apologise to South Africa as a whole for his radical and hateful statements which have over many years sought to divide South Africa and dismantle Madiba’s vision of one nation, united in our diversity,” Van Dame said.
According to the DA, Malema should apologise:
* for vowing in 2008 that the ANC Youth League – which he led at the time before being expelled from the ANC – would take up arms if the prosecution of President Jacob Zuma for alleged fraud and corruption continued. On Friday, the DA won its court case to have the National Prosecuting Authority’s decision to drop charges against Zuma set aside;
* for encouraging the rampant rape culture in South Africa in 2009 when he said the woman who had accused Zuma of rape had a “nice time” and “requested breakfast and taxi money”;
* for embarrassing South Africa and undermining media freedom in 2010 when he called a BBC journalist a “bastard” and a “bloody agent”;
* for the collapse of several bridges in Limpopo, around 2010, “which his company built”. This was supposed to help the people of one of the poorest provinces in South Africa;
* for undermining the judiciary in 2012 when he said voters and not judges should decide on Zuma regarding the corruption case against him;
* for breaking the law in 2013 when he was caught speeding at 215km, in a country with one of the highest road death tallies in the world;
* for rebuking reconciliation in 2015 – the bedrock of democratic South Africa – when he said “We will not be speaking this reconciliation nonsense…”;
* for implying that former president Nelson Mandela was a sell-out in 2015 when he said the first democratically elected president of South Africa compromised on the fundamental principles of the revolution;
* for calling on black women in 2016 to have more babies and in doing so failing to understand the structural gender inequality and poverty that women in particular faced across the country; and
* for encouraging violence and chaos recently when he said he was prepared to remove the government via “the barrel of the gun”.
African News Agency
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