South Africa: SA Parties' Clear Message to Malema - EFF Off!

7 August 2023
Scrolla (Johannesburg)
By Zukile Majova

The Economic Freedom Fighters have emerged as an outcast in South African politics, with all the big parties saying they are no longer prepared to form a coalition with them.

The DA, ANC, IFP, FF Plus, IFP and ActionSA all announced that they would not form coalition governments with the EFF.

Julius Malema's party is on the back foot for insisting on singing divisive songs and chanting struggle era slogans like "Kill the Boer, Kill the farmer".

Until now, the EFF was seen as an important power broker if no party was to win an outright majority in some provinces after the 2024 national general election. But its recent 10th birthday celebrations were seen by many political party leaders as sowing seeds of division and dragging South Africa back to its painful past.

Political parties met in Cape Town at the weekend for the National Dialogue on Coalition Government, led by Deputy President Paul Mashatile.

The gathering, which sought to create a roadmap towards stronger coalition governments in the future, collapsed, with smaller parties saying they were being hoodwinked into supporting a Bill that had already been written by the ANC government.

UDM leader Bantu Holomisa said: "So much for a National Dialogue on Coalition Governments.

"Parks Tau (Deputy Minister of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs) told us that the Bill is already written.

"So why consult with political parties and other role players if the Bill is a foregone conclusion?"

The DA, which has identified the EFF as public enemy number one, also rejected claims that it would rather be in bed with the ANC in the future.

But both the ANC and the DA want a 1% threshold before a party can be represented in a legislature or council.

DA Federal Council chairperson Helen Zille said: "A threshold does not detract from proportional representation. It avoids a situation where a party with less than 1% of the votes becomes the mayor, with enormous powers, of a major city. This outcome is what contradicts proportional representation, not the DA's proposals."

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