Johannesburg - EFF leader Julius Malema has reiterated that the party would march on the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority (Sahpra) offices to demand more Covid-19 vaccines be approved for use in South Africa.
He said the EFF were mobilising the masses to demand that Russia's Sputnik and China’s Sinovac vaccines be given to the people.
“The Minister of Health, prominent leaders have been vaccinated, that is why they do not care about our people. We are going there on Friday to demand that we vaccinate our people and open the economy,” Malema said.
He said artists were supposed to be first in line because they were the most affected since no gatherings were allowed. He said church leaders should also be prioritised. Malema called on them to join the march.
Malema said the EFF would comply with Covid-19 regulations during the march.
“We do not need permission to march in South Africa by the way, you just give a notice. We have a right to protest. It is enshrined in the Constitution. We require nobody’s permission to protest we have notified the authority and we have notified Sahpra,” he said.
Malema proposed a shutdown of schools due to the increased Covid-19 cases.
“We are engaging with the Department of Education. I am happy that the Gauteng MEC of Education Panyaza Lesufi is conceding that we cannot continue business as usual.
“The Basic Education Minister, Angie Motshekga, from nowhere says we have 25 000 schools in South Africa, only 100 schools are affected but we closed the country when the number of infected people was very low compared to the population. So, Motshekga is waiting more than half of 25 000 to be infected first before, what type of science is that?
“They are not listening to science, they are using politics and they are using business interests. We are irresponsible but your president is saying we are going to elections on 27 October. No one has challenged that. He is the most loved president but how do you go to elections when political parties can’t campaign?” said Malema.
He said elections were not just about voting day.
“Former deputy chief justice Dikgang Moseneke has been given a task whether this is possible or not. The IEC goes and launches the elections. If they are not wasting resources with the launch of that, they are wasting resources with Moseneke. Either way, why do you launch while you don’t know what Moseneke is going to say? If he comes and says we can’t have elections, what a waste of money. We could have procured a few hundred vaccines with that money,.
“We gave these people R15 million. We contributed because we believe in the fight against the pandemic but don’t silence or use us. Ramaphosa is slowly becoming a dictator; he does not want politics in South Africa and he is using this unfortunate situation for his personal political benefit.”
Malema said the purpose of the lockdown was to allow that state to prepare health facilities, including procuring vaccines.
“From the beginning, we said ’let's close the country’ and called for harsher lockdown. We supported level 5. We supported the president throughout what happened. In return, the president slept on his job and did not do anything that was supposed to be done during lockdown. It looks like the ANC strategy is that lockdown is the solution to corona. We cannot allow that.”
Malema said the country needed to vaccinate as many people as possible.
He was concerned that the country had not acquired Sputnik and Sinovac. In Europe and China, people were living their lives and soccer stadiums were full.
“Ours has been a complete stupid programme. AstraZeneca vaccine came in with expiring dates that was about to happen in the next three weeks. The paper should have been inspected before it left India. We are throwing away two million doses now from Johnson & Johnson.
“The handling of these vaccine programmes has been one mess after another and it is very clear there is no programme by the government to vaccinate our people.”
Political Bureau