By Zukile Majova
Political Editor
Julius Malema is taking his charm offensive to East London in the Eastern Cape in another stadium fill-up challenge this week.
In the last elections in 2021, the EFF won more than 232,000 votes in the province that is the heartland of the ANC and home of most of its heroes.
Two years earlier, in the 2019 national general elections, the EFF won 155,000 votes in the Eastern Cape.
Encouraged by this rapid growth, the Fighters are concentrating on the province as one of their potentially good performers.
The rally at Buffalo City Stadium is expected to attract more than 16,000 supporters, most from Mdantsane township, where there has been growing unhappiness with service delivery by the ANC-run Buffalo City metro.
East London is also not far from Queenstown, another urban area of weekly protests by a community that is tired of load shedding and water cuts that continue for weeks on end.
In a province where millions of residents are social-grant beneficiaries, Malema will be carrying a popular message.
Juju has proposed to double all social grants: old-age pensions would rise to R4,180 a month; war veterans R4,220; disability R4,180; care dependency R4,180; foster child R2,260; child support R1,020; and grant-in-aid R1,020.
With youth unemployment estimated at 70% in the province, Malema has promised to introduce a R5,000-a-month stipend for unemployed graduates.
He said no one can live on the R350 grant – which is due to increase to R370 next month.
“Without a job, many people are condemned to abject poverty. There is absolutely no child and no adult who can survive and thrive on R350 or R450 per month – worse in a country with rising costs of living. Not even the dogs of the president survive on R450 per month,” said Malema.
The ANC splinter party has the tough challenge of entrenching itself as the main opposition party in the Eastern Cape as the DA has double its number of votes in the province.
And other opposition parties like the African Transformation Movement, the UDM and Umkhonto Wesizwe are all fishing in the same pond.
Pictured above: EFF secretary-general Marshall Dlamini gets the stage ready at Buffalo City Stadium in East London.
Source: X
