EFF leader Julius Malema. (Photo by Gallo Images/Sharon Seretlo)
Provincial leaders of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) have said the party is struggling to build morale and get members to fundraise for the upcoming elections.
This follows the EFF’s 10 year anniversary crackdown in July, which saw representatives who failed to get transport for attendees being fired. A warning was also issued by the party’s national leaders, who threatened to fire representatives should they fail to raise funds for the elections.
“We are struggling to quiet the mumbling in the branches because many of the members are unsettled by the potential of losing their positions. Instead of encouraging the leaders, he [Julius Malema] put fear in them,” a senior KwaZulu-Natal leader said.
“People are finding it hard to go and campaign. The commander-in-chief’s actions so close to elections is overkill and we will pay for it at the polls.”
Last month, the EFF central command team led by Malema fired 210 of its representatives in municipal councils, legislatures and parliament for failing to fill a bus to transport people to the anniversary celebrations held at FNB Stadium in Johannesburg.
The decision was frowned on by many members who said the proclamation was too harsh. This led to Malema’s decision to strip them of their titles instead of removing them from the party.
Despite conceding that the decision to sack the members was harsh, Malema then announced that members had to fundraise for elections, and that failure to do so would result in expulsion.
Addressing task team members earlier this month, Malema said leaders who fail to fundraise for the party during the election campaign would also be punished.
“The battlefield for 2024 will be unforgiving and, as a result, the EFF has to be unforgiving to those who do not have a political and ideological appreciation of the instruction we gave them,” Malema said.
“We say to you today, much more will be expected [of you] in terms of fundraising for our movement, and you dare not fail as you will be failing generations before you, and you will be failing those who are going to come after you.”
Malema added that leaders who had not adopted schools, soup kitchens or any social project since the 2019 provincial and national elections would not return as members of legislature or parliament next year.
He said he would not settle for any result below 50% in the 2024 elections.
The party has shown its ability to grow from previous elections. In 2019, there were significant increases in every province registered, including almost 270 000 new voters in KwaZulu-Natal, the cornerstone of the ANC and Inkatha Freedom Party (IFP).
The party increased its slice of the vote from 8% in 2016 to 10.3% in 2021, with its number of councillors growing from 826 to 1 066.
This is not the first time Malema has threatened to remove provincial leaders. Last year, the EFF dissolved all of its Limpopo provincial leadership structures because of the party’s poor performance in the province during the previous local government elections.
At the time, Malema said that although the party’s performance overall had been “formidable”, it “took exception” to the electoral slide in Limpopo, where it lost 25 council seats and thousands of votes.
As a result, the party had decided to disband the Limpopo command teams at branch, regional and provincial level and had appointed a team of national leaders, led by MP Mbuyiseni Ndlozi, to oversee the process of rebuilding structures.
The pressure to raise substantial campaign funds has added to the EFF’s internal conflict. Provincial leaders said they find themselves doing more work — having to manage the task of appeasing discontented members who worry that fundraising might lead to a diminished focus on the party’s core principles.
“This issue of fundraising has now become difficult because many members have left for other parties in the province, mainly for the Inkatha Freedom Party,” according to a leader from Msunduzi in KwaZulu-Natal.
“These are members who were appeased by food parcels offered by the IFP, because the IFP noticed that we are struggling. Now, having to fundraise will be a problem because we are poor, something leadership is failing to take into consideration,” the leader said.
EFF secretary general Marshall Dlamini said campaigning for elections was not new in the party. “There is nothing unfair about the EFF’s decision. When members sign up to join the party, they join for community work, not for positions. Same thing applies for elections; fundraising is part of the job. The EFF constitution reiterates that positions are not permanent. They have to earn the positions, it is not a given.”
In January, the party ordered that all deputy mayors who served in coalitions with the IFP in KwaZulu-Natal relinquish their positions. This led to the formation of the African Economic Freedom.
Another senior leader in the province said several regions have raised concerns about the party’s latest move to again have a relationship with the IFP in the province.
Speaking at former IFP president Mangosuthu Buthelezi’s memorial service, EFF deputy president Floyd Shivambu said although the two parties might have had disagreements, there was room for discussions as both wanted to topple the ANC in the 2024 general elections.
EFF spokesperson Sinawo Tambo denied that there was discontent in the party, saying it had moved on from the past two months, which had caused a rift, and was now in “election mode”.
“The members of EFF are busy with election mode, those that are talking about discontent will have to deal with the issues before elections. If it’s about poverty, no one in the party came from money, we all worked hard despite not having money to follow the directive of the party.”