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<\/a><\/p>\n27 November 2011<\/p>\n
\nSouth Africa’s firebrand youth leader Julius Malema has turned to cattle farming since his five-year suspension by the ruling party — but will not quit politics, Sunday reports said.<\/p>\n
“I have 20 cattle now. We will breed them, take them to the abattoir, slaughter them and then sell the meat. Now I am finished politically. They are saying I am suspended and all that,” he told the Sunday Times.<\/p>\n
The 30-year-old is fighting his suspension by the African National Congress after being found guilty of provoking divisions within the party of Nelson Mandela that has been in power since 1994.<\/p>\n
“I am not this religious person who believes that some intervention will come from heaven. I have looked at the trends. I have listened to the speeches. They are all pointing in one direction,” Malema told the newspaper.<\/p>\n
But he will not leave quietly and told another Sunday newspaper that farming was a “hobby”.<\/p>\n
“I will not leave politics. I will never leave politics,” he told the Weekend Argus in reaction to reports that he was to step down. “I found a new hobby in cattle farming.”<\/p>\n
“Whatever happens, one will be able to continue in politics. It’s not about positions,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I will die in politics … Even if I get expelled, I will stay in politics.”<\/p>\n
Malema became president of the ANC Youth League three years ago and quickly emerged as a key ally for President Jacob Zuma, who orchestrated the party’s ouster of former president Thabo Mbeki and then won leadership elections in 2009.<\/p>\n
But since then, Malema’s allegiances have shifted and he began praising Mbeki as a better leader than Zuma — remarks that resulted in one of his convictions by the party.<\/p>\n
He was also found guilty of disrupting a national ANC meeting, and of bringing the party into disrepute by calling for “regime change” in democratic Botswana.<\/p>\n
Malema has accused the ruling party of leading a witch hunt against him to silence his calls to nationalise mines and seize white-owned land to redistribute to blacks.<\/p>\n
Seeking to fashion himself as a champion of the poor, Malema will remain the ANC Youth League leader until he exhausts his appeals, a process that could drag on for months. – ANP\/AFP<\/em><\/p>\nAllAfrica – All the Time<\/p>\n
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