Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader, Julius Malema, says the African National Congress secretary-general Fikile Mbalula will succeed Cyril Ramaphosa as the party’s president.
Malema spoke during a media briefing in Johannesburg on Thursday.
“Fikile Mbalula is going to be president of the ANC if there is no serious intervention made to stop him, I warned you about this Mbalula, if they allow him to do what he’s doing he’s going to lead them”
“If this were a Marathon Mbalula is ahead Paul Mashatile is trying to catch up, I don’t know how he will get there,” said Malema.
He claimed Mbalula took control of the National General Council (NGC) event in Boksburg this week, pointing to the secretary-general’s lengthy media briefings and party members chanting his name in front of Ramaphosa.
He said Mbalula delivered a lengthy speech at the NGC event, and President Ramaphosa was compelled to sit through it.
“Mbalula wanted to show them that he is in charge. He’s going for a kill, he’s going to emerge as a president unless something drastic happens,” he said.
Rumours had been circulating about a plan to remove President Cyril Ramaphosa from office in November, but the ANC dismissed these reports as unverified, urging members to respect internal processes and avoid inflaming tensions.
Malema says he dismisses the idea that the NGC was mainly about defending Ramaphosa from internal critics.
“Out of this so-called staged NGC that gets organised in a manner it has never been organised, that was Mbalula’s show of force.”
MALEMA WEIGHS IN ON THE GOVERNMENT OF NATIONAL UNITY
Malema says the Government of National Unity (GNU) has failed to grow the economy and create jobs.
He stated that stagnant economic activities, the collapse of industrial capacity, and the entrenchment of mass unemployment all highlight the crisis at hand.
“The GNU governs as though the working class is disposable, it has reversed the hard-won gains of labour and reduced economic dignity to a privilege reserved for the elites,” he said.
Malema highlighted that the workers are facing a cruel binary, and accept wages that guarantee poverty.
“The EFF recognises that the GNU’s failure is the logical conclusion of a system that is ripe for transformation,” he said.
Malema explained that the GNU waits passively for foreign investors who will never industrialise this country, while the public investment, the largest allocator of capital on the continent props up sectors owned by the white establishment.
“The state refuses to lead development because doing so threatens the interests of the few who designed these coalitions.“
“Municipalities are collapsing because they are treated as trading companies rather than developmental institutions,” Malema said.
He says the GNU has tabled budgets that produce inequality, deepen unemployment and suppress social mobility.
