EFF hooliganism, media opportunism
This week, once more, much of the mainstream media acted as a boom box to the EFF’s parliamentary hooliganism. In most commercial media outlets, the EFF MPs were portrayed as unfortunate victims, or, at worst, as righteous retaliators in the face of unjustified violence. Malema was given acres of print media space and air-time to further elaborate on this victimhood theme coupled with sinister warnings of further EFF perpetrated violence.
Before the arrival of the EFF in Parliament, forcible collective evictions of serving MPs from the House were unknown. An offending MP might be asked to leave the chambers. He or she would duly comply, sometimes with varying degrees of muttered reluctance. The National Assembly’s Sergeant-of-Arms, the mild-mannered, middle-aged Regina Mohlomi, was intended more as a ceremonial appointment, a symbol of a transforming, demilitarised South Africa, and not so much a rule-enforcer.
Before 2014 there was little or no parliamentary hooliganism but considerably more robust debate. Former leaders of the official opposition, I think of Tony Leon for instance, were arrogant and irritating, all the more so because they were effective debaters. When Leon called for a “muscular opposition”, he meant it in the metaphoric and not physical hooliganism sense. Outflanked by the oppositional theatrics of the EFF, the DA in parliament has now lost much of its way.
Tuesday’s eviction of EFF MPs from the National Assembly was the fourth occasion in the current Parliament that this has had to happen. On each occasion the EFF MPs, seeking to pose as victims, have deliberately courted forcible eviction. And on each occasion much of the commercial media has duly played along with the EFF cry-baby, pseudo- martyrdom antics.
This supine, media collaboration is typically constructed by the manner in which reporting on the hooliganism is framed. Consider one fairly typical sample of this – Marianne Merten’s Daily Maverick column posted on Wednesday, the day following the 17th May episode. Headlined “Parliamentary Trenches: Hard hats and hardened attitudes”, the story is placed beneath a graphic photo showing EFF MPs aggressively resisting attempts to escort them out of the House by the parliamentary protection services.
They say that photographs don’t lie. But what you imagine you are seeing in a photograph can be heavily influenced by the text informing it. This is how Merten’s column begins:
“Parliament is stuck in trench warfare between the ANC, using its numerical strength to get its way, and the EFF’s brash and noisy provocation.” Note how this opening sentence pretends to be “balanced reporting”, with its on- the-one-hand and its on-the-other-hand. But note also the several sleights of hand at play. Let’s take these one by one:
“Parliament is stuck in trench warfare between the ANC…and the EFF”. This is stated beneath the photo of the brawl, which triggers us to think that evoking “trench warfare” might be meant literally. Moreover, the juxtaposition of this claim with the photo further gives the impression that those involved in the brawl are the ANC and EFF, when in fact it is parliamentary protection officers seeking to remove the EFF.
Merten does at least concede that the EFF’s tactic of choice is “brash and noisy provocation”. This is a minor shift in reporting from her side on the EFF’s behaviour in parliament. But what is the ANC’s alleged culpability in the matter? The ANC is guilty, according to Merten, “of using its numerical strength to get its way”. That’s ludicrous.
This is a democratic parliament, after all, and decisions are taken either by multi-party consensus (and many are), or by voting based on the majority principle. It is therefore a stretch to establish an equivalence of responsibility for chronic mayhem in parliament between the exercise of the majoritarian principle and “brash and noisy provocation”. The latter phrase is, itself, a rather mild description for the punching of parliamentary officers and the hurling of fire extinguishers.
In all warfare there are victims. So who, in Merten’s imaginary trench warfare, are the victims? It is here that Merten introduces an innovative construct. Having established this pseudo-equivalence between a warring ANC and EFF, it is the other opposition parties that emerge as the victims. “Caught in the middle are opposition parties wanting to use the rules to try to extract even just the smallest concession of accountability at the risk of, again, being dismissed through rules, protocol and procedure.”
Is Merten opposed to Parliament having rules, protocol and procedure? And what does she imply by the risk of “again, being dismissed”? Opposition parties might not always get their way, but that doesn’t mean that they will also be dismissed in the sense of forcible removal from parliament simply for trying “to extract even just the smallest concession of accountability”.
At least Merten seeks to portray opposition parties other than the EFF as the victims of the chaos unleashed by the EFF. The day after, many other newspapers explicitly or implicitly portrayed the EFF MPs once more as the victims or, at worst, as legitimate responders to violence.
Consider the Sowetan’s article on this week’s hooliganism (by Jan-Jan Joubert and Babalo Ndenze). It begins: “A glass entrance door was shattered, furniture damaged and clothes torn” (note how all the verbs are in the passive – no agency is attached, no culpability ascribed)… “as EFF MPs fought back (i.e. they were supposedly just defending themselves) against parliamentary bouncers (note the loaded term “bouncers” invented by the EFF and uncritically taken up by the Sowetan) who removed them violently (again a loaded word, where “forcibly” would have been more appropriate) from the National Assembly at the behest of speaker Baleka Mbete.” A long sentence that ends by implicitly blaming Mbete for it all.
Malema is quoted extensively in the Sowetan article (eight paragraphs), the ANC’s chief whip is given a four-line paragraph, in which the fourth line is “but this was denied by the EFF”. A version of the same story (by the same journalists) is carried in The Times. It is headlined: “Juju: No peace until Zuma quits. Parliament in chaos as security staff battle with MPs”. The body of the story repeats the line that the EFF members “fought back”, that is, were responding to violence.
Die Burger’s front page has a prominent photo of the eviction of EFF MPs, headlined “Huis van skande” (House of scandal) – which, as we learn from its page two story, is a quote from parliamentary absentees COPE which described the eviction of the EFF (and not EFF hooliganism) as one of the “darkest hours” in South Africa’s democracy. The front page photo focuses on EFF Nazier Paulsen in a head-lock, melodramatically squealing for the cameras as he is led out. As anyone in the House would have seen, it was Paulsen who was one of the first to aggressively attack the Parliamentary Protection Services.
In its page two story, Die Burger quotes Malema extensively, justifying the EFF hooliganism and promising more. The ANC’s Chief Whip’s statement issued immediately afterwards, called for criminal charges to be laid against EFF MPs for violence and damage to parliamentary property. Die Burger gives it only one line.
The Citizen has a full front-page photograph of EFF MPs scuffling with parliamentary protection members, but makes light of it with a headline “Parly war games”. On page 3 its story on the hooliganism repeats the pattern of giving extensive space to Malema justifying EFF actions and threatening to “fight back with any weapon”.
At least The Star’s headline took a different view with a bold (and surely correct) front page head-line: “DEMOCRACY CRITICAL. Analysts warn of dire consequences if mayhem in House isn’t stopped”. The Star’s accompanying front page photographs appear to bear out the warning, with a Reuters photo of two EFF supporters (the one deceptively dressed in a smart white shirt – he is allegedly Malema’s bodyguard) hurling a fire-extinguisher at the white-shirted parliamentary protection officers behind a glass door. Fortunately the glass was strong and no-one behind the door was injured.
But the accompanying story on The Star front page (attributed to Thabiso Thakali, Siyabonga Mkhwanazi and Craig Dodds) unfortunately drifts back into the old paradigm of the EFF hooligans being the victims. “Chaos erupted when National Assembly Speaker Baleka Mbete ordered EFF MPs to stop disrupting the proceedings…” (We are implicitly asked to believe that there was no chaos before Mbete asked the EFF MPs – repeatedly by the way – to stop their disruptive activity.) “School pupils seated in the public gallery shrieked in horror as the EFF members were dragged from the chamber…” (Are the journalists sure that the scholars’ horror was provoked by the eviction of the EFF MPs, or by the MPs unseemly behaviour?). But the crowning and disappointing moment in The Star story comes when the “experts” are quoted. Professor Shadrack Gutto blames the parliamentary officials’ “strong arm tactics”, and he asks “whether the force used is justifiable or proportional”. Professor Pierre de Vos is quoted saying “normally in other democracies there wouldn’t be a forceful removal of members of Parliament from the chamber, unless there is direct threat to lives.”
Either de Vos is being misquoted, or he is conveniently forgetting that “normally in other democracies” (unless we are remembering Germany early 1930s) opposition parties don’t threaten (as Malema did) to “physically prevent” a sitting president to appear in Parliament. Malema has also recently said that he would take on the ANC-government “through the barrel of a gun”, and that there would be “no peace in Parliament until Zuma goes”.
De Vos is also conveniently forgetting that in the US Congress, for instance, it is not infrequent for recalcitrant members to be forcibly evicted. The difference is that they compel the officials to carry them off one by one, without offering physical resistance.
None of this is to argue that ANC conduct in recent times within the House has always been perfect. In the course of yesterday’s budget votes, many of us on the ANC benches applauded when our Chief Whip stood up at one point and called the ANC caucus to show greater respect for the dignity of the House and for the DA speaker who was at the podium at the time. There have also been occasions in the past when parliamentary officials, caught flat-footed by the unprecedented recklessness of the EFF, handled difficult situations clumsily.
All ANC members should certainly categorically condemn the ANC Youth League President’s utterly stupid call (reported by News24 yesterday) that ANC MPs should carry the physical fight to the EFF in Parliament. “If they want a fight, they must be given a war.” If asked whether he meant this literally, Maine is reported to have said “Yes”. Maine must surely face an ANC disciplinary committee for his serial misconduct.
But none of this justifies the EFF’s extremely dangerous flirtation with violence and anarchy in Parliament and beyond. And none of this justifies the complacency and even collaboration of much of the media (and their “specialists”) in the face of a very serious threat to our hard-won constitutional democracy.
Cde Jeremy Cronin is a stalwart of our liberation struggle, former member of the ANC NEC. He is currently an ANC MP and Deputy Minister of Public Works, and writes in his capacity as SACP First Deputy General Secretary.
This article first appeared in the SACP journal Umsebenzi Online.
