Economic Freedom Fighters Deputy President Floyd Shivhambu says the support he and party leader Julius Malema received from Winnie Madikizela-Mandela gave them the courage to form the party.
Shivhambu is at the Orlando Stadium in Soweto where Mama Winnie’s memorial service is taking place.
Shivhambu says Madikizela-Mandela was amongst the few members of the African National Congress (ANC) who pleaded that he, Malema and the late Secretary-General of the ANC Youth League Sindiso Magaqa not be expelled from the ruling party.
This came after they were charged for bringing the party into disrepute in April 2012.
“Even after the sentencing, the expulsions and the suspensions, she took us to Bizana. She built our confidence. She said you are revolutionaries in your own right, don’t ever doubt yourselves that you can still lead the fight for economic freedom in whatever platform you deem suitable. So if we had lost contact with Mama Winnie immediately after the expulsion, perhaps we would still be decrying that we had been expelled from the ANC. Perhaps the EFF would never have been formed.”
The EFF is meanwhile holding a memorial service in Brandfort, Free State where Madikizela-Mandela was exiled for eight years by the apartheid government.
Watch the live stream of the official memorial service of Winnie Madikizela-Mandela below:
