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On Friday evening, hundreds of residents in Zola, Soweto, waited just under two hours for the arrival of Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema, who was scheduled to meet them at 5pm.
Still, as the clock ticked on and it got colder and darker, the group stayed put for Malema, who was tied up in an unexpected legal battle.
As the young party tackles local government elections for the first time, the EFF believes this group and others in the Soweto area are an indication that the party has built up a layer of loyalty and support.
While the ANC and DA slugged it out in Port Elizabeth this week, the EFF hit the ground running in Gauteng, holding a series of community meetings in preparation for their own election manifesto launch, set to take place on April 30 at Orlando Stadium.
Meetings were held in Meadowlands, Zola, Orlando, Ekurhuleni and Pretoria.
On Thursday night, residents of Meadowlands got face time with the “commander in chief” when he arrived at a community meeting, where they entreated him to help them combat unemployment and a lack of housing in the area.
“Please tell us, Juju, what you will do for us as young people – what in your policies will help us, since we are unemployed. The ANC tells us to wait for next year, but we are hungry now,” pleaded one young resident.
Meanwhile, in the city of Tshwane yesterday, the party worked to pull a crowd that filled the University of Pretoria’s Mamelodi campus hall, where Malema presented his Solomon Mahlangu lecture.
The lecture was presented amid a legal battle on Friday, where the family of the slain struggle icon interdicted the EFF from hosting the lecture in his name. The interdict was later withdrawn.
“We never asked our families if we could go fight in the struggle; we just answered a call to fight apartheid. Therefore, a family cannot say now we must ask for permission to use a name. It is a courtesy to ask them,” Malema said at the beginning of his address.
He then came out guns blazing at those who wanted to commodify the names of struggle icons for their own benefit.
He said that the party was not out to commemorate Mahlangu the individual, but rather him as the face of a fearless generation who took the apartheid regime to task and was instrumental in the liberation of South Africa.
He then asked the crowd of at least 2 000 if they were living out the legacy of Mahlangu by holding the government and their municipality accountable.
Outlining what they will look for in EFF councillors, Malema said they wanted caring people: “We want people who are going to be mother and father figures; people who will use their own cars to take the elderly to get their pensions.”
The party has said it will not be releasing names of mayoral candidates and has remained mum on what its strategy will be going to the polls.
While Malema spoke in Tshwane, President Jacob Zuma gave his address in Port Elizabeth.
Malema commented at the end of his lecture that the stadium Zuma was addressing was not even full.
“It is over for Zuma. The people have abandoned the ANC. The ANC is history. Zuma is history. Bye-bye,” he said.
