GARETH VAN ONSELEN: What analysts said at the EFF’s formation
News that expelled former ANC Youth League leader Julius Malema intended to form his own political party first broke on June 11 2013. In a story titled Malema Ready to Bounce With New Radical Party, The Star reported that Malema intended to organise "radical militants" within and outside the ANC, "to come together and talk about an alternative platform". Just more than a month later, on July 27 2013, the EFF was formally constituted. After overcoming an inane objection by from the Freedom Front Plus, the party was later registered with the then Independent Electoral Commission (on September 5) and, on May 7 2014, it partook in the national and provincial elections, finishing with 6.35%, 1,169,259 votes, 25 seats in parliament and 30 seats among the nine provincial legislatures. The EFF and Malema himself have been hard at work advertising the party’s upcoming five-year anniversary. On Twitter, the party has made much hay out of a 2013 analysis that was dismissive of the party’s pros...
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