This weekend the Zanu-PF supporting Sunday Mail (Zimbabwe) published extensive reports on an interview between Assistant Editor Munyaradzi Huni and expelled ANC Youth League President Julius Malema. Malema was quoted as saying that he did not think that South African President Jacob Zuma was “a neutral facilitator in the Zimbabwean problems. He has very strong views about President Mugabe and Zanu-PF.” This “hatred” he put down to Mugabe’s perceived past support for former President Thabo Mbeki.
Malema also denied allegations that he had been bankrolled by elements in Zanu-PF stating: “I don’t have any business in Zimbabwe and I don’t get any funding from Zimbabwe. I wish Zimbabweans can make an offer which we can declare in public because I am now unemployed. I will never be shy to do business with my fellow Africans…if I had anything to do with Zimbabwe, I would declare it. I am under investigations by South African authorities. We all know that they are chasing me so they have access to my bank accounts, access to my cellphone…Tyson (Minister Saviour Kasukuwere) is my only friend in Zimbabwe and if I was involved in any deals with him, they should have picked it up.”
He said that his earlier visit to Zimbabwe had sharpened his pre-existing radicalism. “The reason why I was welcomed properly in Zimbabwe is because of my radical stance, but I must say I even got more inspired in Zimbabwe . I learnt that people can take charge of what rightly belongs to them. Not cowards. Zimbabweans are not cowards. They are not scared to take a risk. That’s why even those who leave Zimbabwe illegally to cross into South Africa, they cross through rivers that have crocodiles.”
Malema also commented on white South Africans, Jacob Zuma, Kgalema Motlanthe and other matters. Key extracts follow below.
On white control of the South African economy:
“They [whites] control everything. They hold 80 percent of the economy. They have got huge influence in the judiciary, they have got huge influence in the media and even in politics. Some of them have even co-opted some of our leaders into their neo-liberal agenda of undermining a progressive change. So you should not undermine their influence and actually they have noticed that because there is some lack of unity amongst the freedom fighters, that represents an opportunity for them to infiltrate us and to regroup and still perpetuate the apartheid laws and an attitude by manipulating the democratic laws. So they use our own laws, they use our own state to actually continue with their agendas of making the black majority South Africans suffer. And they do that unashamedly, some of our leaders are part of that now. There are some amongst us who have just sold out and are not prepared to continue with the struggle.”
On the need for whites to surrender their land:
“They need to just change the conditions and they need to be prepared to share with the rest of the country, including surrendering the land they stole through committing black genocide when they engaged in the wars of dispossession. They need to begin surrendering some of those things because our people are running out of patience. We are now going into almost 20 years into democracy and our people have got very little to show for this democracy, and this cannot be correct. So the sooner they surrender, especially the economic power, which is what our people need today, the better in order to guarantee their security.”
On his views of Jacob Zuma:
“I think I have made a point that we actually misled ourselves because, like artists, we decided to throw our own imaginations which were not real. We used to say President Zuma knows everything about the economy, he is an economist . . . but the reality is that, he didn’t know anything about the economy. We said he was a unifier, but the reality is that he is a divider. The ANC is more divided today than it was before and his style of leadership is that of being intolerant to those who have got a different view.”
On who will be elected ANC President in December:
“I don’t want to predict that because there are many names that the comrades are throwing around, but it’s definitely not President Zuma. I don’t see him coming back. He should face reality and start packing his bags. As a way to show that he has no confidence, he has suppressed anybody from speaking about that because he is scared of rejection.”
On Kgalema Motlanthe:
“The ANC has contributed a lot to what we are today and the ANC continues to play that role. I wouldn’t single out one individual because we are close to many leaders of the ANC, but I know that Cde Kgalema Motlanthe made a huge contribution, especially when he became a national leader when I was president of COSAS we would make radical statements and he would make time to sit down with us . . . he would sit down with us and engage us on the statements we would have made, including giving us guidance as to how some of those statements could be very dangerous. We always listened to his advice and we always appreciated his patience.”
On Zuma’s views of Mugabe and Zanu-PF
“I think Zimbabweans and Zanu-PF and President Mugabe, what contributes more to his hatred of those comrades is because of their close relationship with President Mbeki then. And I think he suspects that they might have supported President Mbeki and not him and this is an opportunity to get to them.”
On the reasons for his expulsion from the ANC:
“… I was expelled for Botswana, but Botswana is the resolution of the Youth League. It’s there in black and white. I was expelled for African leadership, but there has been a decline since the departure of President Mbeki. It’s there in the resolutions of the Youth League. Those are not Malema family trust resolutions. They are resolutions of the Youth League. They didn’t expel me because of those things. They are scared of the Youth League. They are scared of children. They are cowards because if they were not cowards, they were supposed to challenge our views through branches of the ANC.
They must put those views to the test and see if those views will see the light of day. But they know that if this Youth League is still there, its views will prevail. They are scared of nationalisation because they are in the pockets of capitalists.
On whether he believes he will one day lead the ANC:
“Yes, I will lead the ANC. When you grow up in the ANC, in the Youth League, you are actually in a school to become the leader of the ANC.”
On the recent South African court rulings against Zanu-PF regime:
“South African courts should never create an impression that they have jurisdiction in Zimbabwe. Zimbabweans have their own courts. Zimbabwe is a sovereign country and South African judges and the judiciary should respect that. They can’t instruct the government of South Africa to say go and do this investigation about Zimbabwe. It’s wrong. It’s not done. Zimbabwe should be respected. It’s not a tenth province of South Africa.”
