Newly appointed ANC chief whip Pemmy Majodina arrived back from Cape Town Thursday saying the only way to deal with the militant and rowdy EFF MPs was to “keep calm”.
She said calmness was the best medicine because the ANC, and not the EFF of Julius Mamela, had a lot to lose by virtue of being the ruling party. “I am not approaching this with the attitude of ‘deal with them’ because I’m going to lose the plot if I take that approach.
“The ruling party has everything to lose and they [the EFF] don’t.
“I must lead with humility such that people can associate with us,” said Majodina.
In what may have been a baptism of fire as chief whip, Majodina was heckled in parliament by the EFF MPs during her praise-style nomination of Cyril Ramaphosa as South African president.
EFF MP Mbuyiseni Ndlozi shouted out that Majodina should nominate Ramaphosa quickly and “not give a poem”, and that she must confine her praising him to the kitchen.Majodina said she only learnt of her appointment to be the party’s most senior MP, the chief whip, at the national executive committee meeting in Cape Town on Monday.Turning to the ANC Youth League, Majodina, who was the the first woman to serve as the league’s national treasurer when it was unbanned, said: “I’m not happy about the state of the youth league in the province and nationally. We don’t have a youth league that is supposed to be preparatory ground or school for the ANC.”Asked whether the ANC in the Eastern Cape could trust its current youth structures enough to to send young politicians to parliament – as the DA did with Yusuf Cassim, who was sworn in to the legislature on Wednesday – Majodina said the appointment of Oscar Mabuyane as premier was an indication that the party had trust in politicians who filtered through its youth ranks.“We were also once young and we encourage that this province has a young premier in Mabuyane. Before him there were older leaders, but now you can see winds of change.”soyisom@dispatch.co.za..