Neutralise Malema’s rowdy show of forcefulness

4 April 2023

Ferial Haffajee on 21 March 2023 in Daily Maverick described the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) as South Africa’s party of violence. Haffajee is spot on. After all, Julius Malema and his followers refer to themselves as Fighters. And “fighters” more specifically have a physical meaning.

The EFF do indeed commit violence. They assault people; they threaten to assault and to kill; they damage property and intimidate wherever they go. This is thuggery and usually also crime.

The list of crimes is long. I refer to only a few. In January 2018 they burst into H&M stores and damaged property because they were angry about an advertisement.

In March of the same year, Floyd Shivambu, deputy leader of the EFF, assaulted a journalist, Adrian de Kock, in the parliamentary precinct in Cape Town.

In January 2019, an EFF member of Parliament, Marshall Dlamini, assaulted a parliamentary police officer, warrant officer Johan Carstens.

In September 2020, the EFF attacked Clicks outlets after the instruction “Attack” had gone out from EFF members on social media. Four hundred stores had to close their doors temporarily.

In March 2021, EFF students assaulted an eNCA journalist.

In January 2022, Malema and other EFF leaders intimidated restaurant owners in Gauteng because they employed foreign nationals.

In September 2022, the EFF threatened Pick n Pay and forced the managing director, Peter Boone, into a meeting.

On 9 February 2023, EFF members of parliament stormed the President in Parliament and were stopped just in time by parliamentary security.

In January 2023, Malema announced that the EFF would force the entire country to a standstill on 20 March. According to Malema, this would be the beginning of the revolution. Everybody, from business people to nursery schools, was threatened to close that day or to face violence.

In most of these incidents the evidence is overwhelming and was captured on camera.

Then of course there is the notorious threat uttered by Malema in November 2016 that he would not call for the slaughtering of white people, at least for now. Malema also is notorious for his bloodthirsty “Kill the Boer” chant.

In addition, there is a long list of incidents where he and his cronies threatened and in some cases assaulted journalists. There also are numerous incidents of hate speach against Indians and coarse insults against anybody, whether local or foreign, who abhors Malema. “I will fuck you up outside. I will kill you outside,” was the threat uttered by Malema to a member of parliament of Mali in June 2021 in the Pan-African Parliament. The list of violent behaviour is much longer.

It is important to understand that Malema’s political arsenal contains only one strategy: to project (ostensible) forcefulness. In this way, and using hardly anything else, he mobilises support.

So far this has yielded fruit for Malema, not because he really is strong, but because he convincingly creates the appearance of being strong. This being his only “strategy”, he can only continue doing more of the same in an extravagant way so as to show off even more brutality and forcefulness.

In so doing he can mobilise still more support. This is the reason for Malema’s bold step to announce a countrywide shutdown and revolution.

Until recently, Malema’s show of force has been successful, not because he and the EFF actually are so strong, but because he has been allowed to show off in a forceful manner.

Firstly, Malema owes his image of forcefulness to a tattered criminal justice system that has allowed him and his henchmen to get away with their actions time and again with impunity. This is notwithstanding the fact that there is overwhelming evidence and that prosecutions would have been simple. Failure by the criminal justice system serves as incitement to further brutishness.

Secondly, Malema was let off lightly by the Human Rights Commission (HRC) when they gave him the green light for his bloodthirsty statement against whites, namely that he would not call for the slaughtering of white people, at least for now. This was another incitement for Malema’s politics of violence.

Thirdly, the courts also are to blame. Finding that incitement to violence by shouting “Kill the Boer” was not unlawful, amounts to an outrageous judicial error and dereliction of duty, especially in the midst of a situation of violent crime. This was yet another invitation to Malema to fan the flames of violence without consequences to himself.

The ANC, too, has glossed over Malema’s politics of violence. Twelve years ago they assisted him when he had to defend himself in court for the first time for his Kill the Boer chant. And now we are seeing a replay with the recent collaboration between Malema and the ANC in Gauteng municipal councils and the support in some ANC circles for an ANC/EFF coalition if the ANC should loose its absolute majority in next year’s general election.

Then came the climax of Malema’s biggest show of forcefulness and brutality so far. He announced that he and the EFF would be starting a revolution on 20 March 2023. This would begin with Ramaphosa being ousted from office and economic activities being shut down completely. Those who refused to go along, would be forced to do so by violent means. And even in the run-up to 20 March there were incidents of intimidation.

But then Malema was disenchanted. His fighters ignored his call-up instructions and stayed home. Reasonable numbers of supporters turned up only at a small number of spots. But not nearly enough to spare Malema and his supreme command embarrassment. Ramaphosa remained in office without a problem and there was no sign of a revolution. At many places the turnout was so pathetic that the video clips made a mockery of Malema.

So Malema had to change his tune. Forgotten for the moment was his call for revolution, uprisings and threats of violence. According to Malema, this was simply a peaceful march to defend the constitution – exactly the opposite of the behaviour of a forceful Putschist at the forefront of the seizure of power.

What has gone wrong for Malema? Well, he totally overestimated his ability. But the actual reason for the failure was something else.

Firstly, the state – the police and the defence force – showed that they would draw a line in the sand. This was demonstrated by the early removal of 24 000 tyres destined to be burned on 20 March. Then of course, large numbers of soldiers were called up and even Ramaphosa himself warned that no unrest would be tolerated. In addition, Fikile Mbalula, ANC secretary-general, lambasted Malema.

Secondly, the country’s private security industry, employing a force of more than three times that of the police on behalf of its clients, businesses in particular, was in a state of preparedness.

Thirdly, a large part of the public in all communities had had enough of Malema’s thuggery. They, too, drew a line in the sand. Kallie Kriel, on behalf of AfriForum, posted videos warning that AfriForum’s 160 neighbourhood watches where organised would protect communities.

Malema’s fighters duly took note and realised that they would not be able to cope with this situation. The projection of power by the state, private security and organised public was so much stronger than that of Malema that his fighters did not even report for duty.

This clearly showed how to counteract Malema: neutralise his show of power and brutality by demonstrating much greater power and a preparedness to crush his thuggery.

This is not difficult to do, because Malema and the EFF have been shown not to be powerful.

However, power is measured in relative terms, namely how strong a group, gang of thugs or whatever is in comparison with the powers opposing them. If a mob of thugs are given free rein, they are strong. If they are properly opposed, they keel over because of their weakness. Such was the logic that came to culmination on 20 March.

The only weapon Malema has in his arsenal is the rowdy show of forcefulness. This image has been broken, causing great damage to Malema and the EFF. Ismail Lagardien is correct, however, in saying that Malema in all probability now is more dangerous than ever. Therefore, expect that he will try to restore his damaged profile of forcefulness by attempting to perform something outrageously brutal in the near future.

However, like any extremist politics, thuggery can succeed only if the forces opposing it are negligent and allow it to take place. Only then Malema can again try to appear strong. In relative terms, however, he is so weak that the state and any civil formation can decisively neutralise his and his henchmen’s show of forcefulness. This is what now must happen consistently.

Koos Malan is a constitutional jurist from Pretoria.

*This article was first published in Afrikaans in Rapport.