What do you make of Julius Malema?

[Loony]

...

[Blanquist]

I don't know what I am supposed to make of this man.

He has been convicted of hate speech against South African whites on numerous occassions and encouraged killing of whites. Amongst all sorts of other misconduct such as attacking journalists, has been expelled from the ANC last month. He has openly supported Robert Mugabe and gone against what the ANC stands for.

Although Wikipedia is quite dodgy I have given the link to a Wikipedia site, which explains Julius a little better than I can.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Julius_Malema

Never heard of him. Don't really know much about SA. Interested to learn.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

He's a populist, not a fan of that. In addition, he advocates the murder against other working people. He doesn't hold our views on society, which is solidarity, unity, and camaraderie, from all demographics, which could be ethnic, nationality, sexuality etc.

[Manic Impressive]

He's a capitalist politician. Nuff said

[Manic Impressive]

Does he really advocate killing white people? Or did he just sing a traditional song about fighting occupation. I mean the way I've heard it is the song isn't much different from the Irish rebel songs.

[Loony]

...

[Manic Impressive]

It seems to me as though a lot of the stuff about Malema has been right wing propaganda whipped up by the same people who said that there would be civil war or persecution of whites when apartheid ended. No doubt he says a lot of stupid stuff, but compared to Zuma he looks like Einstein. So really what I'm saying is I think he's targeted by the media and made out to be this arch villain but he should still be opposed as a capitalist. He's a bit like Chavez in that way.

But then again my knowledge of him is based on a few interviews and a few articles and I can't say I'm particularly up to date with SA politics

[Os Cangaceiros]

Based on that wiki article, he seems like he's kind of an asshole.

[Robespierres Neck]

Murdering white people? No, I don't support racists. I'll be really surprised if anyone says they do support him.
I can understand the people of Africa having resentments towards whites - looking at the history of French & British (among others) colonization - but you're missing the point if your simply singling out the race.

[Loony]

...

[Manic Impressive]

Well I was more thinking of the rest of the world media and some other things I've seen made by white south africans, which gave me the impression that much of the anti-malema stuff is from apartheid supporters trying to create a culture of fear. I don't think I've seen much from inside South Africa about him it's usually BBC reports or occasionally some American stuff

[maskerade]

Malema is a populist, as well as an opportunist. There are rumours that he has amassed a personal fortune through Casinos and construction contracts, though they may be unsubstantiated.

However, as crass as he is, the reason he is getting into so much trouble with the ANC is because he advocates large scale nationalization of South African resources. South Africa has long been ruled by mining companies (once they were South African, now they are small components of large conglomerates), and Malema is turning the constitution against the ANC - there is a provision in the SA constitution that states that all resources belong to the people, or something like that, and Malema is using that to channel popular opposition toward neoliberalism into concrete demands for nationalization.

In that sense, I think the circus surrounding Malema is very interesting. Yes, he is not a socialist/communist by any definition, but his quest for power/publicity (whatever you want to call it) is based on popular resentment of inequality and poverty. The ANC saves face toward the international community by lambasting Malema's choice of songs and by doing so obscure the real issue: capitalist exploitation of South African resources.