Cantankerous: Julis Malema argues with police at the president’s guest house in Pretoria. Photo: Emmanuel Croset/Getty Images
Tuesday.
Llike many of my fellow South Africans, I thank Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema.
Not for trying – and partially succeeding – to shut down the country, or for an additional public holiday that I could not enjoy because I had to cover it, but for two days of uninterrupted electricity supply that was miraculously available on the night of the protest.
Thanks to the Red Berets, there is no daily consultation about the schedule to relieve the load on Sunday – or on Monday – and most importantly, there is no need to find an alternative place to watch Arsenal against Crystal Palace.
Whether the increase in the availability of electricity is an effort by the state to demobilize the masses in response to Malema, Increase planning in the power plant or the result of plugging the Minister of Electricity Kgosientsho Ramokgopa into the grid, for a few days at least, me and my device have all the power we needed.
I will take it.
I also thank our tire minister, Bheki Cele, for his efforts to ensure that the 24 000 Goodyears, Continentals and Pirellis collected by the Fighters in the weeks before Monday’s protest were kept from being used as burning. barricade.
Cele and the officers seem to be doing better in prison radials than solving murders; more skilled when it comes to cuffing that cross-plys than in bringing the looters of the country’s treasury to the book.
The “tools of the trade” were removed before the Fighters could light up.
Once, there are vans available – thousands of people actually, along with water cannons, Nyalas and the entire fleet of helicopters – away from the situation in ward 33 and the rest of KwaZulu-Natal when they were really needed in July. 2021.
It seems that regardless of whether the police do something to stop potential looting and arson – or attempted insurrection, for that matter – depending on who is stealing and burning and trying to overthrow the state.
On Monday, there were as many policemen and security guards as EFF members – more correctly – when the Fighters gathered at the KwaZulu-Natal provincial office on Bulwer Road at the beginning and end of March.
The Fighters did not stop at Durban City Hall, the common end point for most protest marches.
The EFF helped the ANC retain control of the city last year and sits on the eThekwini executive committee – it’s like dying, a taste of what the party is offering the ruling party if it doesn’t make the magic 50% in next May’s election and needs a coalition partner – so why besiege the seat of power it holds , at least partially?
The Fighters didn’t reach Phoenix – the obvious destination of choice – which is good because they could still walk (22km like a crow) if they didn’t take the Sandile Thusi road from the left. beach and heading west.
The blue wall was also there when the Red Berets arrived at Florida Road to try to spoil the long weekend they told punters’ to show their support for calls for President Cyril Ramaphosa to step down. It stops progress and turns left onto Currie Street and back to the office.
It is a similar story in Pretoria, where the EFF is joined by the leaders of several smaller parties, who have decided to jump on the bandwagon and remind them that they will still be there when they vote next year, and by the Federation of South African Trade Unions. – or at least one of its fractions.
Visually vibed unity in action, but the number failed to number – or at least to the point that they can send Sri Lanka the moment the government claims the EFF is seeking – like that frolic in the presidential pool. Malema and his friends must have needed it after a long walk in the sun.
Next time, perhaps.
I giggled as I watched Malema – and African Transformation Movement spokesperson Mzwanele Manyi – walk alongside expelled ANC member Carl Niehaus towards the Union Buildings and the official residence of the president.
It’s not just the optics or the irony of the moment.
Comrade Carl’s fingers are notoriously sticky, so it’s better to keep them from wandering into your back pocket – and wallet – than connecting with your own digits?
Superior logic, in action.