Pretoria – The EFF this morning said there were few vehicles on the streets as South Africans take heed of the national shutdown called for by the opposition party led by Julius Malema.
Speaking to broadcaster Newzroom Afrika before 7am, EFF national chairperson Veronica Mente said the protest is steaming ahead and “everything is good to go”.
She said people who have opted to go to work, ignoring the call to protest, were doing so unhindered by the EFF.
“That narrative, that we are going to be breaching other people’s rights has been driven by the governing party and the DA because they wanted to instil fear in our people. We told our people that protesters will be approaching the streets and if anything happens, because they have planted vigilante groups that are going to be attacking people within our protest, that can be a harm to our innocent citizens of this country.
“That narrative of we are going to be attacking people, intimidating people and all of that (is not true). People are going to be joining the march in numbers. If someone says the country is going on as normal, that is also not true,” Mente said.
“There is nothing usual today, many businesses have closed down. There is minimal traffic on the roads. On the roads I travelled on this morning, there are simply no cars, few to no cars in many roads. The police and the soldiers are the ones blocking the roads because they are searching every car, trying to know what is happening. They are successfully blocking the country.”
This morning, Police Minister Bheki Cele said scores of people had been arrested in connection with disturbances linked to the national shutdown.
IOL