Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) leader Julius Malema has struck a notably softer tone towards former president Jacob Zuma, describing him as a “kind old man” after Zuma visited his family home in Seshego, Polokwane, following a bereavement.
“We are not ashamed of his visit,” he told party supporters at the EFF’s voter registration launch on Saturday.
“We are happy that he came as an elder to comfort us. We say to Msholozi, let it not only be the Malema family — even other families who are experiencing what we are experiencing today should continue to receive your support, because you are a kind old man.”
Malema framed the visit as an expression of shared humanity. “We belong to different political parties; we will never come together. But when death occurs, we will always come together and show respect for each other, because it is for the love of Africans.”
Zuma’s visit to his family on Friday was the highest sign of ubuntu, he added.
The remarks mark a shift in tone after Malema previously labelled Zuma’s uMkhonto weSizwe party “enemy number one” following a wave of defections from the EFF after the 2024 elections.
On Wednesday, Malema told his supporters that they should reject Helen Zille’s potential candidacy as Johannesburg mayor for the Democratic Alliance in the upcoming local government elections.
“She’s too old,” Malema said. “You will be led by a white person who doesn’t have teeth, who failed in Cape Town and told our people from the Eastern Cape who were going to settle in Cape Town that they are immigrants.
“She’s leaving Cape Town to come to Johannesburg — what must we call her? We must reject her, whether she is white or not. We don’t support the candidature of Zille. We are not our mothers and fathers who grew up believing that a black man’s remedy is a white person.”
Malema questioned why the DA would field Zille in Johannesburg, saying she failed dismally while she was mayor of Cape Town.
“Go to Khayelitsha, go to Langa to see what is happening there. Go to the Cape Flats and see the levels of crime. Crime is worse in Cape Town, where they were leading. How can they fail in Cape Town and come and work here?
“We must wake up and stop being misled by white people. Helen is white and all of a sudden you think she will do all the good things. She was supposed to do good things in Cape Town and she failed.”
Malema also described Zille’s actions of watching the Soweto derby in a tavern last month as pure racism, saying it made black people seem like drunkards.
A picture of Zille trended on social media showing her holding a Heineken and celebrating after Orlando Pirates won the Soweto derby.
“What Helen did in that shebeen — she did not support Orlando Pirates; it was pure racism. She thinks that when black people celebrate, they carry beer. She says, ‘I must carry a beer so that they think I’m part of them.’ We reject Helen with a beer; we are not beer people.”
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