The Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) has rejected the deployment of the South African National Defence Force (SANDF) across the country, ahead of Monday’s national shutdown.
The party said “the dictator” President Cyril Ramaphosa has deployed 3 474 members of the SANDF to suppress peaceful protests against his failed administration and crush shutdown calls for his resignation.
“This act demonstrates the bloodthirsty nature of the current government and the intolerance of the ruling party to dissent and opposition. South Africa has degenerated into a military state, and the deployment of the army to suppress the constitutional right to protest, means we have returned to the dark days of apartheid,” the party said in a statement on Sunday evening.
Apartheid tactics
The EFF said the current deployment of the army and law enforcement agencies for the shutdown surpassed that of the apartheid regime in the 1980s during the state of emergency, saying this meant Ramaphosa has declared war on the people of South Africa.
“The scenes of military personnel descending into the townships of South Africa, police men searching the homes and cars of citizens without warrants or just cause, and shutting down tyre shops reveal a paranoid government that is capable of grave human rights violations,” the EFF charged.
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The international community ought to pay close attention to South Africa on the Monday shutdown, the party said, because the government of SA has prepared itself to commit a massacre in defence of a corrupt president.
“The EFF calls on the people of South Africa to come out in their numbers and join the national shutdown. No intimidation should prosper and we must resist the tyranny of [Ramaphosa], the same way we resisted the apartheid government,” the EFF added.
Operation Prosper
Parliament announced earlier on Sunday that Ramaphosa has deployed 3 474 SA National Defence Force (SANDF) members to work alongside police officers to maintain law and order during the EFF’s national shutdown on Monday.
Parliament said the president informed speaker Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula and National Council of Provinces chairperson Amos Masondo of the SANDF deployment to combat crime and preserve law and order during the shutdown.
According to spokesperson Moloto Mothapo, the deployment was in line with Section 201(2) (a) of the Constitution of South Africa of 1996 and Section 19 of the Defence Act of 2002 and will cost the taxpayer a total of R166 562 058.
The deployment has been effected under Operation Prosper.
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