Johannesburg - The student protests against university fees increases was an indication that the poor have the power to remove the ANC from the government, EFF leader Julius Malema said on Sunday.
Addressing hundreds of residents at Zandspruit informal settlement near Randburg on Sunday, he urged people to emulate the students in their struggle for a better life.
He was on a drive to mobilise residents to attend his party’s economic freedom march on Tuesday.
The EFF plans to march to the Chamber of Mines in the Joburg CBD to fight against the retrenchment of miners.
The march will proceed to the JSE in protest against labour brokers.
“Labour brokers take the little salary you make and keep you poorer. You’re basically working for free,” Malema said.
From the JSE, the march will move to the Reserve Bank to advocate that the working class qualify for credit so they can also buy their own houses.
“This government works to please the white people. They don’t care about the black life,” Malema added.
As he spoke, residents chanted his name. Hundreds climbed on top of shacks to get a glimpse of the EFF’s commander-in-chief.
The firebrand leader spoke from the back of a truck addressing a crowd made up of the elderly and the youth.
“Why are you still voting for the ANC when you have been living in shacks for 20 years? When the rainy days come it’s just chaos. Where is the ANC?” Malema asked. “Even the students don’t want the ANC. People were promised free education and they (the ANC-led government) never delivered. The students demonstrated that the poor have the power to destroy the ANC.
“Those students wore the ANC T-shirts and they threw stones at the ANC. Why are you still holding on? You are living in a shack. Where is your dignity?”
Malema said domestic workers employed by white people were subjected to adverse working conditions.
“Your mothers working for white bosses are being raped. They are quiet because they are afraid of losing the job (that) stands between them and poverty.”
He said residents must refrain from thinking when they voted for the ANC, they voted for Nelson Mandela.
“Those days have passed, we have to move on. Now it’s about delivering services. We thanked Mandela and others who fought for freedom.”
The Star
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