/ 1 February 2011

Youth league seeks to clarify Malema’s nightclub comments

The ANC Youth League on Monday sought to clarify its president Julius Malema's controversial comments about the upmarket ZAR club in Cape Town.

The ANC Youth League on Monday sought to clarify its president Julius Malema’s controversial comments about the upmarket ZAR club in Cape Town.

ZAR owner Kenny Kunene threw a pre-opening bash at the Cape Town Waterfront on Saturday night, which was attended, by among others, the youth league president.

Malema was reported as saying: “[Democratic Alliance leader] Helen Zille will not close ZAR at 2am, like she does to other clubs in Cape Town. The ANC owns ZAR and we will party until the morning.”

The DA-controlled city recently introduced new liquor by-laws regulating alcohol trading hours.

“Contrary to what is reported, the ANCYL president said that the freedom and right for black people to own a club in a predominantly white territory is a freedom and right that came because of the ANC,” the league’s spokesperson Floyd Shivambu said in a statement.

“He [Malema] then made an emphasis that even the reactionary DA government cannot curtail that right because it’s now entrenched in our Constitution,” Shivambu said.

Photographs of the launch party showed Kunene pouring champagne into the mouth of a scantily clad woman. Kunene has also been photographed eating sushi off a scantily clad woman at the Johannesburg branch of his club.

‘Not into nightclubs’
Kunene also allegedly indicated that Malema had his vote if he ever ran for president.

ANC secretary general Gwede Mantashe said on Monday that that the party was “not into nightclubs or partying, but is a revolutionary movement”.

Mantashe said in a statement marked as urgent: “The African National Congress distances itself from sentiments allegedly attributed to the ANC Youth League President, Cde Julius Malema.

“We furthermore reiterate our condemnation to the act of serving sushi on a woman’s body, as this act is anti-ANC and anti-revolutionary.

“The act is defamatory, insensitive and undermining of woman’s integrity. We therefore appeal to all those involved in this act to immediately disengage from it,” said Mantashe. – Sapa