Billy Ntaote
SOUTH African opposition party, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF), has waded into Lesotho’s political melee by calling on Prime Minister Thomas Thabane to reconvene parliament and President Jacob Zuma to recall the premier’s South African Police Service (SAPS) guard with immediate effect.
In a statement penned by party spokesperson, Mbuyiseni Quintin Ndlozi, the EFF described the deployment of the SAPS in the Mountain Kingdom as “undermining Lesotho’s sovereignty and self-determination”.
“The Prime Minister of Lesotho must allow the country’s internal processes to unfold under the collective leadership of Lesotho’s duly elected parliament,” the EFF stated.
“There is no reason why the prime minister has not delivered on the promise to reopen parliament, except the fear of being held accountable regarding claims of corruption.
“A single individual cannot hold the entire region at ransom, simply because he wants to rule alone, running away from answering to parliament, and to make matters worse, under the protection of a foreign security guard.”
Lesotho’s problem is not security related but political, the EFF argues, adding that Pretoria’s intervention in Lesotho was “misinformed”.
The party, led by expelled former African National Congress Youth League president Julius Malema, also takes issue with the recent appointment of South African media and mining tycoon, Atul Gupta, as Dr Thabane’s special advisor, whom they accuse of influencing the premier to suspend Parliament on 10 June.
“The Lesotho prime minister appointed the Gupta family as his advisors who then advised him to shut down parliament,” the EFF alleges.
“The Gupta family is a destructive tsotsi family that seeks to destabilise African countries and it too must be stopped, particularly as pushed by the unaccountable, lawless and tsotsi President Zuma who introduced it to Lesotho in the first place.”
The EFF said it would “promptly” take up the issue in the South African Parliament.
Meanwhile, the All Basotho Convention (ABC) Secretary General Samonyane Ntsekele has dismissed EFF’s remarks as “unfounded and disrespectful”.
Mr Ntsekele further accused the EFF of “jumping into issues they are not conversant with”.
“This statement shows the EFF consists of a bunch of clowns who are disrespectful to their state president and think they can also be disrespectful to our prime minister,” Mr Ntsekele said.
“They should know that the prime minister in Lesotho is a respected public figure.
“They cannot equate Lesotho’s politics to South Africa’s, and it’s not even clear how the Guptas come into what is currently happening in our country.”
Mr Ntsekele urged the EFF to first assess Lesotho’s political landscape before rushing to comment.
“They should stick to committing their disrespectful actions in South Africa,” he said.
“We know them to be a bunch of clowns in the South African Parliament and have seen how shameless they can be since they seem to have lost their humanity.”
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