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Malema loses appeal, expelled from ANC

Malema loses appeal, expelled from ANC
04/02/2012 00:00:00
by Aislinn Laing I telegraph.co.uk

JULIUS Malema, the ANC's outspoken youth league leader, has lost an appeal against his suspension from the party for "sowing divisions" and bringing the ANC into disrepute, and has been told to stand down as president immediately.

Malema was told that his claims of bias by some members of the disciplinary panel which convicted him and suspended him from the party for five years were "naive and ridiculous".

Cyril Ramaphosa, the business mogul who heads the appeals committee, added that Malema's claim that the ANC Youth League was independent of the mother party was "absurd in the extreme".

The decision is a major setback in the career of the young firebrand, who made his name by backing Jacob Zuma in his 2007 battle to unseat President Thabo Mbeki.

More recently, he has made headlines around the world with calls for mine nationalisation and Zimbabwe-style land seizures as the solutions to the country's vast wealth gap.

He was found guilty in November of calling for regime change in neighbouring Botswana; unfavourably comparing President Zuma to Mbeki, and storming into a meeting of senior officials.
He responded by accusing the disciplinary committee that ruled against him as being used to "settle political scores".

"(Disciplinary committee chair) Derek Hanekom's dismissive approach to everything the ANC Youth League said shows he had a different agenda to implementing the ANC constitution," he said.

His chances of swaying the appeals committee were slim. Aside from avowed capitalist Ramaphosa, the group includes Trevor Manuel, the former finance minister who has made no secret of his dismay at the calls for mine nationalisation, and Jeff Radebe, the justice minister who was speaking when Malema stormed into the ANC meeting.

Ramaphosa did grant Malema and five of his colleagues suspended with him permission to present mitigating arguments to the disciplinary committee.

But the upholding of the convictions activates a previous, suspended conviction Malema was handed in 2010 for responding to a chiding from President Zuma by complaining that the former president, Thabo Mbeki, had never publicly upbraided him.
That conviction is a suspension from the party for two years, which now comes into effect.

Malema was present in Luthuli House, the ANC headquarters, and met with the appeal committee shortly before the press conference. But he later slipped out of a back door to escape the media scrum.

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While there was no repeat of the violent scenes which marked the beginning of the hearing, when bussed-in supporters of Malema clashed with riot police, a small gaggle of "Juju" – Malema – fans sang and danced outside.

Skhalo Nong, 28, a delivery driver from Katlehong township outside Johannesburg, paused from chants of "Viva Juju! Viva!" to remark: "There is nothing wrong with what Malema did, he is fighting for us – he is our voice.

"We still want to nationalise the mines, the banks, the land – we want our world back, we want our country back for the blacks."

Fiona Forde, author of the recently published Malema biography, An Inconvenient Youth, said Malema's career may not be over yet.

"Ultimately, Julius' fate will be determined by whether Jacob Zuma remains in power past December. If he does not, he might well be brought back into the fold," she said.

Labels: ANC, ANC YOUTH LEAGUE, CYRIL RAMAPHOSA, JULIUS MALEMA

posted by MrK @ 12:25 PM