Tshwarelo Hunter Mogakane
Pretoria - EFF leader Julius Malema has called upon President Cyril Ramaphosa to resign with immediate effect in order to allow police to investigate a string of charges laid against him, including kidnapping, defeating the ends of justice and bribery.
During a press briefing held at the Winnie Madikizela-Mandela House in Johannesburg today, Malema told the media that Ramaphosa conspired with Namibian President Hage Geingob to apprehend thieves who stole an estimated amount of R60 million in foreign currency.
This follows the opening of criminal charges laid by former State Security Agency head Arthur Fraser at the Rosebank police station and a 48-page affidavit imploring the SAPS to investigate the multimillion dollar Phala Phala farm scandal associated with Ramaphosa.
The affidavit detailed the trespassing and housebreaking that took place, including the apprehension and torture of the suspects and the involvement of Presidential Protection Services head Major Wally Roode.
"The EFF calls upon Ramaphosa to step aside with immediate effect because no policeman will investigate a sitting president who has violated laws in order to avoid justice. Ramaphosa has established himself as an individual who will go to great lengths to avoid accountability and his continued stay as a president while this matter is being investigated will jeopardise this case.
"The EFF has also assembled a legal team which will be led by Advocate Thembeka Ngcukaitobi to look into a constitutional provision to have Ramaphosa step aside.
The integrity of our nation is at stake. The EFF will do everything in its power to make sure that Ramaphosa pays for the crimes he has committed in this country. Ramaphosa has portrayed himself as an anti-corruption crusader who has the divine right and entitlement to arrest anyone who is opposed to him as an individual and to the white capitalist establishment. Enough is enough!" said Malema.
Malema said it was bad for the country to have different rules and laws for different people.
"When Thandi Modise said she was not there when her pigs starved to death she was still arrested and charged. Today, we are not talking about animal rights, but human rights of people who were tortured in the house of the president through the instruction of the president," said Malema, answering media questions.
Malema said Ramaphosa could not open a case because millions of dollars were kept in mattresses and couches at the Phala Phala farm.
"There is no bodyguard in South Africa who can enter the house of a president and torture suspects. Bodyguards do not enter the house, they stay outside. They only come in due to invitation. They cannot torture a domestic worker without instruction from the president.
"The president took an oath to protect the Constitution. Why did the president not release a statement? He has to take South Africans into confidence. They want to conceal this crime because there are proceeds of crime. Kunesandla semfene. There is something going on there that we need to get to the bottom of," he said.
The EFF leader also issued a strong warning to those who want to paint Fraser as a factionalist instead of a whistleblower.
"I want to warn the president. There is more. There is more where money in dollars is counted in a plane. Let them continue to push Fraser. There is more.
Malema took issue with one media house following questions that were unrelated to the Ramaphosa issue.
The EFF leader warned that media houses that kept protecting Ramaphosa face being sanctioned by the political party in future.
"The arrest of the Guptas might just be a diversion. The State wrote its own letter and put its own bullet to claim there are threats against the director general. When the public did not buy that story then they now say the Guptas have been arrested," said Malema.
Pretoria News