Johannesburg – The ANC should be worried by the EFF winning 10% of the votes in Gauteng in the general election, the EFF’s Dali Mpofu said on Thursday.

“If I was the ANC I would be worried about that,” Mpofu said at The New Age breakfast briefing in Johannesburg.

“We are represented in all nine provinces, all the legislatures. To me that is priceless. We have a footprint around the country.”

He said the Economic Freedom Fighters was the fastest growing party in the country.

“The ANC has lost 15 seats, that’s the reality. The DA [Democratic Alliance] gained 22 seats and the EFF gained 25 seats so we are the fastest growing party in South Africa. That trend is definitely going to continue.”

He said the African National Congress needed to learn how to govern differently.

Perspective

After listening to opinions from a panel of political analysts, Mpofu said the election results should be looked at in a proper perspective.

He said the EFF could not be compared to the Congress of the People, which came third in the 2009 election and was the new party at the time.

“We started off eight months ago. We didn’t have any money. And the ANC and the media blemished our leader, not like Cope,” he said.

“The media was used against us, all sorts of shenanigans were used – we were denied stadia, our adverts were banned, our posters were removed… so it was clear.”

Despite this, the EFF campaigned effectively and took 10% of the votes in Gauteng.

Throughout the run-up to the elections, the ANC did not underestimate the EFF, he said.

“The ANC did not underestimate us. They had no illusions. Other people were rubbishing us,” said Mpofu.

“They [the ANC] know we know the game. We know how to go to the ground and how to work the ground. The ANC knows that. We are going to show that going forward.

Nkandla

Before Mpofu spoke, political analyst Adam Habib said the controversy around the Nkandla saga had played a role in the election.

“I think Nkandla hurt the ruling party. It seems to me that the ANC paid the cost of it. If I was the ruling party, I’d be very, very worried.

“If you lose these big cities, if you lose the middle class, you cannot claim to be a party of modernity, you cannot claim to be a cosmopolitan party of the 21st century.”

He said the results of the elections had sent a strong message to the ruling party.

Public Protector Thuli Madonsela found that President Jacob Zuma and his family unduly benefited from R246m security upgrades to his private home in Nkandla, KwaZulu-Natal, which included a swimming pool, a cattle kraal, and an amphitheatre.

Two days before the 7 May election, Zuma attempted to justify the upgrades by speaking publicly about the rape of his wife in 1999.

“My homestead was burned twice during violence… These criminals came, raped my wife during the time I was still the MEC,” he said at the time.

Zuma was KwaZulu-Natal economic affairs MEC between 1994 and 1999.

He said the perpetrators were arrested, charged, and convicted.-Sapa

Johannesburg – The death of the mother of Western Cape rape and murder victim Anene Booysen’s was met with sadness by the Young Communist League of SA (YCLSA) on Wednesday.

“The YCLSA sends its deepest condolences the family and the community of Bredasdorp,” spokesman Khaya Xaba said in a statement.

E-News Channel Africa reported earlier that Corlia Olivier died from cervical cancer in a hospital in Bredasdorp.

She was diagnosed with the disease in December, the broadcaster reported.

Olivier was tasked with overseeing the Anene Booysen Skills Centre in the area, but was unable to do so because of her illness.

The centre, which was set up in Booysen’s memory, was established by the higher education department and the Construction Sector Education and Training Authority.

Xaba said: “We say now that she is gone the centre must not shut down and must continue to serve the youth of Bredasdorp”.

Booysen’s biological father Klaasie Speelman was stabbed to death last week near a Bredasdorp dumping site. A 29-year-old man who was arrested for his death last week allegedly asked Speelman for money, and he gave him R10.

“The man was [allegedly] not satisfied with the money and stabbed him to death when he could not give him more,” police spokesperson Lt-Col Maree Louw said at the time.

Booysen was raped and disembowelled, and died in Tygerberg Hospital, Cape Town, on February 2 last year.

Her killer Johannes Kana was given two life sentences for crimes against the teenager. His attempt to apply for leave to appeal against his conviction was denied by the Western Cape High Court.

SAPA