‘SA in early stages of dictatorship’

JOHANNESBURG: Julius Malema has warned that South Africa is in the “early stages of dictatorship”, citing his removal and suspension from the National Assembly, which he said was an assault on the constitution.

“It doesn’t matter how much we irritate one another, there must be tolerance, that is what democracy is about,” the EFF leader and MP said yesterday. Malema said the founders of the constitution protected MPs from being sued for what they said in Parliament so that they could not be intimidated. He said his suspension was done without due process.

This was equal to imprisonment without trial and he described the parliamentary protection services that removed him from the House as “a mob justice looking for blood”. “Apartheid rules are being brought back to Parliament through the back door by the ANC,” he charged.

“We are in the early stages of (a) dictatorship.”

Malema was evicted and suspended from Parliament last week for refusing to withdraw remarks he made that Deputy President Cyril Ramaphosa was “a murderer for his role in the killing of mineworkers in Marikana”.

The EFF leader said he was taking the rules adopted by the National Assembly that allowed security to remove him, and his suspension, to be tested in court.

Malema also claimed that his party had finally got President Jacob Zuma into a “corner” after the Constitutional Court agreed to hear their case on whether Zuma could simply ignore the remedial actions recommended by Public Protector Thuli Madonsela into the Nkandla debacle.

Malema also lashed out at the newly elected ANC Youth League leadership for accusing his party of stealing the league’s ideas on the political programme of economic freedom.

Malema said his party would lead a march to the Chamber of Mines, Reserve Bank and JSE on October 27 to demand that the sectors play a meaningful role in the lives of South Africans.