Julius Sello Malema, founder, Commander-in-Chief and President of the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), a South African Political Party, disclosed in a chat with Newzroom Afrika that some South Africans have threatened not to vote for him unless he pledges to back the deportation of foreign nationals back to their respective countries.
Malema, many say has his eyes set for the Office of the President of South Africa in 2024.
Sello, who is popularly known with his adorned red beret, has always maintained that “no African is a foreigner in Africa.”
He was a global voice against Xenophobia and looting of foreign-owned shops when crisis ravaged the “rainbow nation” years ago.
He, however, pledged that he rather be a President of his children at home than back the deportation of foreign nationals; a decision that has drawn the ire of many South Africans who have pledged to punish his party at the polls.
“Someone said to me ‘if you want us to vote for you in 2024 you must abandon this thing of foreigners.’ I’m prepared to go home. I’m fine. I will never take a platform and denounce Africans. I will never do it. If it means votes are going, let them go. I’m prepared to go home. But to take a platform and please the White minority by pointing a finger at other fellow Black brothers, I’m not going to do that. When I see a Nigerian or a Zimbabwean or a Congolese or Ghanaian, I see myself.
“The EFF can do internal research to see how much this thing is hurting the EFF, but I am not prepared to take a platform to say, ‘Foreigners must go home.’ I would rather not be the president of South Africa. I will be the president of my children at home. We will practise Cabinet issues there. I don’ want. You mean I should go and tell these hungry Zimbabweans to leave and when I tell them to leave, I send them where?”
