Johannesburg - A united Africa with open borders and "an obligation to create a socialist future" formed the outline of Julius Malema's opening address at the EFF's second National People's Assembly (NPA).
On Saturday, at the Nasrec Expo Centre south of Joburg, Malema delivered a wide-ranging, three-hour address where he also spoke against the mooted privatisation of South African Airways, asserting that the EFF should work with what he called "other left-leaning organisations" such at the National Union of Metalworkers of SA (Numsa).
The leader said the reason for the party's formation in July 2013 was because the "material condition of our people was becoming worse and the former liberation movement (the ANC) could not be trusted to fix this".
"It has been a difficult journey fighting against the false unity of the post-1994 dispensation. We are being taken to court for fighting the land," he said.
Alluding to the NPA theme of "consolidating the ground towards socialist power", Malema said that if each of the 1.8 million people who voted for the party in the May 2019 elections were to recruit at least five people, the EFF would attain 10 million votes in 2024 "and a decisive victory".
"Consolidation of the ground means turning the quantity of votes. We should build a socialist future. We are in pursuit of a class struggle. The EFF motion in the Joburg council got almost 7 000 workers insourced and improved the wages from R2 500 to R7 000, with full employment benefits," he enthused.
He reiterated the EFF's position that the SA Reserve Bank should be nationalised, calling it a fallacy the notion that billions of rand would be needed to buy out its shareholders. He said the shareholders only earned R200 000 annually.
"It is not possible for someone to want billions of rand when they weren't going to earn those billions of rand in their lifetime."
On Africa, Malema said South Africans "had a deep-seated hatred for the African continent", which he contended was because this country did not see itself as part of Africa.
"Even when some of you go to Nigeria, you say you are going overseas. You even encourage your children to learn foreign languages and show them off to your house guest.
"We must encourage our children to speak other African languages. Stop this nonsense of teaching our children Chinese... They must learn Swahili," Malema charged.
The conference continues until Monday, December 16.
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