Johannesburg - The latest attack on the EFF comes a month after suspended members launched a court action against its commander Julius Malema and his generals, accusing them of rigging the December 14 elections for the leadership.
Malema’s adversaries – former party co-ordinator Mpho Ramakatsa, Andile Mngxitama, Khanyisile Litchfield-Tshabalala and Lucky Diliza Twala – want the High Court in Joburg not only to nullify those elections, but every decision taken by party leaders subsequent to that, including their suspensions.
They said the elections were flawed, with people being intimidated to vote for a particular a person, while other delegates were “bribed to agree to a particular faction’s slate”, they claimed.
“The relief sought is based on various serious procedural irregularities and the violation of rights in the election process at the 2014 NPA (national people’s assembly) as a result of which the elections for positions in the CCT (central command team) were not free and fair, democratic or regular, and which virtually assured the first to 41st respondents of their positions in the CCT,” said Ramakatsa in an affidavit annexed to the court papers.
On election day, delegates were allegedly intimidated or bribed into following Malema’s lead, raising their hands to vote for candidates only when he did so.
As a result, only Malema’s preferred candidates were elected into the top positions.
“The president’s will became the will of the people. Those he didn’t raise his hand for didn’t make the threshold,” Ramakatsa said in an affidavit supported by Mngxitama, Litchfield-Tshabalala and Twala.
Candidates who did not cower into submission, such as Nonela Ndabula, “did not have their accommodation and transport paid for” and were, therefore, forced to sleep in a minibus taxi they had travelled in from Cape Town to Mangaung.
Also annexing her affidavit to the papers was Letty Phetla of Ga-Marishane, Limpopo. She was not an elected delegate but had received a call seven days before the elections, instructing her to attend the assembly as a delegate, despite her ward not having elected her.
On her arrival in Mangaung, she was “given a slate by the provincial secretary of Limpopo, Jossie Buthane, and instructed to vote accordingly”.
Also left with “no option but to follow the instructions” after being “intimidated” was Olerato Mabeleng from North West, who said the party’s provincial chairwoman, Betty Diale, had given her a slate and instructed her to “mimic her (Diale’s) actions in that I should raise my hands when she raised hers, which would be a signal to nominate a candidate, and to remain motionless when she failed to raise hers, being a signal to abstain from nominating a candidate”.
She was also instructed to “mimic Malema’s actions”.
The provincial command team had told them that Malema would be taking pictures as proof they were following instructions, saying “those people who did not vote for the commander-in-chief’s preferred slate would be dealt with accordingly”.
It is understood the EFF has requested an extension after filing notice of intention to oppose the application.
The Star