“I am the Creator — of a television show that gives hope and joy and inspiration to millions.” Christof, The Truman Show.
Attending a service at the Apostolic Faith Mission River of Life in Soshanguve on January 27, EFF leader Julius Malema casually remarked that, “I was even saying to the pastor that we've forgiven Zuma because of the sermon.” His comment didn’t elicit much attention. But let us dwell on it for a moment.
First, it is important to understand that, when it comes to character judgment, Julius Malema is no Sigmund Freud. Instead, the main antagonists in his life, and words, are ascribed those attributes that, rather conveniently, mirror whatever grand conspiratorial fantasy he is presently in the grip of.
In this way, former President Thabo Mbeki was put through the “Malema Moral Washing Machine”.
He went in, as Malema would describe him in those early days, as a “sophisticated dictator”, coward”, and “snake” — a man who “abuses power” and, he implied, a president generally “useless” at addressing the needs of people. He emerged several years later as, “the best leader the ANC has ever produced”.
It wasn’t enough, however, to fully atone for Malema’s sins.
And so, after he learnt the hard way — that demagogues don’t do loyalty — Malema altered course again, and headed towards Damascus. “We are here today to once again apologise to former president Mbeki for being part of those who removed him on the basis of lies and rumours spread by the sitting president,” he said in February 2016 — one of many similar remorseful displays of contrition, including a bent knee before Mbeki’s mother, Epainette.
He would step carefully enough — it was Zuma, not him, who spread the “lies and rumours”.
Since then, Malema has gone so far as to canvass Mbeki personally, declaring in August 2016 that the former president had given him a “very, very positive response” when asked if he might vote for the EFF in the upcoming local elections.
The one thing you will never get out of Malema is indifference. He will never say, “You know, I am just not sure about that fellow — could be good, could be bad, could be both; it’s hard to tell.” And the reason for that is no person is, in fact, a person. They are at best an absolute ally; at worst, a total enemy, but always and above everything else, a metaphor in a story he is telling.
People are characters for Malema only in the sense that they are part of a play. It’s a binary world, full of gods and devils, with Malema inevitably in the thick of it all. They can switch roles with no more than a click of the fingers. But whatever their temporary and prescribed assignment, it is just that. And it is designed to serve an entirely political purpose.
Because he operates in a goldfish bowl, one where the media generally have no memory outside of what happened yesterday, it works wonderfully well.
Of all his antagonists, and there have been many, the greatest is Jacob Zuma — a man he used with brutal expedience to build a reputation on the back of, and then took that reputation and trampled all over said back, always mindful to avoid the many and various knives he had stuck into it.
But when he loved Jacob Zuma, he loved him dearly.
“If Jacob Zuma is corrupt, then we want him with all his corruption. We want him with all his weaknesses. If he is uneducated, then we want him as our uneducated president,” Malema said in February 2009.
“He will be the best-ever president of the Republic."
Well, careful what you wish for, the saying goes. A good deal further down the road, and in the throes of trying to establish a new political party, Malema was now no longer big on graft and ignorance. The play demanded something else, and so Zuma’s character was appropriately rewritten to accord with audience demand.
He was now an “illiterate president” and Malema and the EFF were champion corruption-busters who promoted intelligence and “superior logic”.
“We don’t want to be like Jacob Zuma,” he said in 2017, “We don’t want to be like Zuma’s family, we want to be educated, that is what we are fighting for.”
As for Zuma’s various unethical inclinations, well, there is no shortage of condemnation on the public record. He was now no more than a common criminal. And a thief: a man so mired in corruption and maladministration he had compromised an entire country.
Poor Zuma. He was, after all, only being Zuma. And Malema along with a whole army of green, black and gold zealots had not only held the door open for him, but fairly pushed him through.
They wanted a corrupt incompetent; going by their own words, their wish was granted.
Today we are told that Zuma has been forgiven. For what? Fulfilling the dreams and aspirations of his greatest supporters? He must be scratching his head and thinking, “where did I go wrong?”
Zuma complains these days, via his legal counsel, that Malema has a “personal vendetta”. Of course he doesn’t. Malema doesn’t do vendettas. All he does is manipulate the idea of people into whatever shape or form best suits his overarching plotline on the day. People loved the “Zuma is the Devil” storyline. It rang true. But then so did the “Zuma is Jesus” storyline. The only thing that actually changed was the audience.
As an aside, you have to admire Malema’s bravado. Being forgiven for anything by Malema, least of all before you have been tried or convicted, is akin to being inducted into a philharmonic orchestra by a toddler banging two tin pots together, while he screams blue murder.
The Malema Moral Washing Machine is always hard at work. Some time ago, he rammed the public protector into it. As she tumbles around inside, it is difficult to work out what will emerge. First, the EFF voted for her. Then she was a spy and a constitutional fool. Now the EFF wastes no time lodging complaints with her, thereby legitimating her opinion as authoritative, in order to stick it to his contemporary enemies, such as Pravin Gordhan.
You never quite know how someone will emerge after a thorough rinsing. It kind of depends on how they behave. If the public protector delivers a favourable verdict, her praises will be sung from the rooftops.
But people can also be put into the machine clean and pure, and emerge sullied and evil. It has a reverse cycle. Robert Mugabe suffered that kind of wash — not that he cares. But again, it’s very rarely about the person per se; rather, the archetype of them Malema has created. Cyril Ramaphosa was once a “murderer” with “blood on his hands”. Now he and the president exchange jokes and smiles in the National Assembly. Wonder how that subplot will eventually play out?
Is anyone immune from the washing machine? Not really. There are the EFF’s own, of course, the Shivambus and Ndlozis of this world. The stars of the great play. But, like 60% of the EFF’s national parliamentary caucus, who have been fired or demoted in some way or other since 2014, don’t think for a moment they have a part for life. If Jacob Zuma teaches us anything, it is that: friends are always simultaneously enemies, just they don’t know it yet.
The EFF’s world is a soap opera, full of pettiness and personal gossip, misunderstandings and mistakes, forgiveness and vilification. It revolves, first and foremost, about individuals; a world fashioned around personalities, heroes and villains, each subservient to a story arc only Malema can see.
And the greatest trick he ever pulled was convincing all and sundry there was some sort of objective consideration as to where their character should go. It doesn’t work like that in soap operas. There are no heroes or villains, just empty vessels, to be filled with whatever twists and turns drive up ratings.
The “forgiveness” arc is a good one. Everyone loves a redemption story. What will the next chapter will be? Perhaps Zuma will become possessed by a demon? A modern day Marlena. Exciting.
It’s why we keep watching, really. Just like why Truman was so unsuspecting for all those years — an artificial universe, a bubble, built and co-ordinated by one man, only to serve that same man.
Outside, the world tunes in everyday, to see who will be next to get the chop. Or, drama, who will be brought back to life.
• Van Onselen is the head of politics and governance at the South African Institute of Race Relations.
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