SASCO notes and welcomes the Equality Court ruling pertaining to the gratuitous comments attributed to the President of the ANC YL, Julius Malema. We are delighted and overjoyed by this court ruling. We regret that these unsavoury comments by comrade Julius Malema were made in a SASCO election rally last year. This was a gratuitous abuse of our platform and left many students gobsmacked about the relevance of this incident in a SASCO rally. This ruling is a vindication of the struggle against patriarchal domination, particularly in the light of the 100th anniversary of the international women's day.
Malema's comments showed a disdain to women and their continued oppression under a patriarchal capitalist system. It was unnecessarily triumphalist over the outcomes of the JZ rape case, a tendency not even shown by comrade Jacob Zuma himself, who instead of basking in triumphalism like Julius Malema decided to extend an olive branch to his accuser. Julius Malema spoke as though oblivious that patriarchs, in their conspiracy against Zuma abused the rape accuser's financial woes. In a largely elite male political game, the anti-Zuma side used the well-known public outcry over sexual violence against women as a political trump card against the other, with which they had hoped to taint Zuma as a political opponent, regardless of whether he was found guilty of this act or not.
Malema showed ignorance to the fact that the class position of many women often makes them vulnerable to the might of powerful men, especially in politics. The former ANC Chief whip in parliament Mbulelo Goniwe's case on sexual harassment of interns at his mercy is but a case in point. Malema made a mockery of the hundreds of women in South Africa who are subjected to rape in the hands of the men on whom they are financially dependent. His irresponsible and sexist comments about rape had the potential to further deter women from reporting rape. Beyond this, however, we welcome this ruling for it sets the precedent that no longer can men who wield political and financial power exercise their patriarchal muscles at women with reprieve.
Statement issued by Mbulelo Mandlana, SASCO president, March 16 2010
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