Four & Fighting Fit!

Years of defiance, guts and small victories – the EFF had much to celebrate at their recent birthday bash

- Thulani Gqirana

PIECE by piece, street by street, house by house, person by person. This, according to Julius Malema, is how the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) is going to woo supporters away from the ruling party.

And the way things are going, they might well get it right. After all, who thought the party the disgraced former ANC Youth League leader started four years ago would do as well as it has? Back then it was a bit of a joke – now laugh at it at your peril.

Love him or loathe him, there’s no denying the EFF frontman knows how and when to get people going.

Take the party’s recent fourth birthday celebrations in KwaZulu-­Natal. On the menu, along with a big red EFF cake, was a main course of Gupta bashing, a healthy side of anti­Zuma knocking and a dessert of EFF to the rescue.

The party will continue the fight for a corrupt-­free South Africa, Malema says. No one is better equipped than the red berets – a party that began as a protest movement and has grown into a force to be reckoned with.

THE GROWTH

Like any new party, the EFF started with zero. No members of Parliament, no councillors, no structures and no voters. Now the party has 25 MPs and branches all over the country.

It has a life of its own, Malema says, and it’s growing all the time. “Today I’m happy to report to you that we’ve got 827 councillors in South Africa, represented in almost 90 percent of municipalities,” he told his supporters at the birthday celebration.

For a party that started with nothing but a manifesto, it’s an amazing achievement, Malema added.

“We’ve made Parliament hold the executive accountable. We’ve made serious proposals in Parliament on how land can be resolved and we’ve made submissions on dealing with illicit financial flows.”

THE PROVINCES