COVER STORY
“A broader mass movement should be mobilised in South Africa
in defence of these massive economic reforms, because they
constitute the core of our economic emancipation programme.
“Mass campaigns on what nationalisation (people and state
ownership and control) of minerals, metals and other strategic
sectors of the economy will entail, should be conducted to garner
support from the people as a whole,” it says.
Were it to have its way, the EFF would establish a “state bank”,
which would be accompanied by transformation of the financial
sector. It would limit foreign ownership of what it considers
strategic and monopoly sectors.
In the May 2014 National Elections, the newcomer won 6,35%
out of a total of 1,168m votes, making it the third most popular
political party after the ANC and the DA. The result was enough to
secure parliamentary seats for 25 of its top leadership. Its strongest
provinces were the North West, where it won 12,53% of the vote,
Limpopo (10,27%), Gauteng (10,26%) and the Free State (7,89%).
While this is nowhere near enough to pose a threat to the ruling
party, it performed far better than older rivals. The next most
popular party was the Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP), which won
2,4%, less than half of the EFF’s support.
Agang, initially lauded as the answer to the ANC’s increasing
culture of corruption and the DA’s elitist image, failed to crack the
top 10. This was mostly due to a string of political blunders by its
leader, Dr Mamphela Ramphele, as well as its lack of connection
with ordinary citizens.
The result is a clear indication that extremist views are taking
root in South Africa, where economic inequalities are rife and no
clear government solution to the problem of unemployment is
being seen.
Upon his release from prison in 1990, former President
Nelson Mandela voiced his support for nationalisation, a fact
which Malema takes full advantage of in his promotion of the
state appropriation of important private assets in the economy.
However, Mandela later made an about-face and abandoned the
policy as a way forward for South Africa, preferring to focus
on nation-building and selling South Africa as an attraction for
foreign investment.
Dawie Roodt, chief economist and director at the Efficient Group,
says despite the EFF’s success and apparent growth in popularity,
it won’t have much influence on national economic policy.
“First, it’s important to look at the leadership of the EFF,” he
says. “It exists only because of the charisma of one individual
(Julius Malema), rather than an idea. If that individual were not
around, I don’t think the organisation would continue to exist.
“There is also doubt around the quality of the leadership. If
[Malema] did what he allegedly did, he could easily turn on his
current colleagues.”
Roodt says now that the EFF is in parliament, it has no chance
of gaining the support it will need from the ruling party, the ANC,
which won 62,15% of the national vote and 249 seats in parliament.
It seems Malema has made more enemies than friends in the ANC.
“I think the EFF has reached its peak,” Roodt says. “It will be
very entertaining in parliament, but I don’t think it will have much
impact on actual policy.”
Shortly after his induction, Malema’s seat in parliament came
The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) are campaigning for a
state bank to limit foreign ownership
under threat when a looming tax debt of R18m meant his stay
could be a short one (were a sequestration order to be filed against
him), further eroding his party’s influence. However, he dodged
the bullet at the end of March when the South African Revenue
Service accepted an offer of compromise he made to pay the
outstanding debt over time.
Roodt also sees holes in the party’s ideology, which is
unashamedly founded on Marxist views and targets a disgruntled
working class. He says: “Any political movement should have
some sort of ideology and most people would say EFF has one, but
its economic policy is all over the place.
“The first paragraph of the EFF’s manifesto sounds like Stalin’s
or Mao’s work, and what happened after those guys implemented
their policies was that lots of people died of starvation,” he says.
Under certain circumstances, nationalisation may make sense.
Many countries around the world have nationalised parts of their
economies to varying degrees of success, including the UK and
the US.
In the UK, the recent global economic crisis led to banks such
as Northern Rock and Bradford & Bingley (mortgage book only)
being nationalised. Last year the UK’s Network Rail became a
public entity when the government took over the company’s
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