No more ‘Ja Baas’: The ANC attacks AfriForum, saying it is a racist organisation that resists tranformation

The ANC has slated AfriForum’s drive to have its Secretary General, Fikile Mbalula, prosecuted, saying it is the work of a racist organisation.

Last week, AfriForum announced that Mbalula is set to be criminally prosecuted for falsely accusing the former Bergview College principal, Jaco Pieterse, of rape.

The case dates back to October 2024, when a mother alleged her child was raped at the Bergview College in Matatiele, Eastern Cape.

Many people, including EFF leader Julius Malema and Mbalula, accused Pieterse of the crime, and he and the school’s caretaker were targeted on social media.

However, they were never suspects. Police Minister Senzo Mchunu apologised to Pieterse for identifying him as a suspect.

Despite the lack of evidence, Mbalula condemned AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit for providing legal assistance to Pieterse.

He accused the lobby group of shielding a rape suspect rather than standing up for justice in South Africa.

“You see, when a person is sick, a rape of a 7-year-old, it is not a question of consciousness that you need to convert this person. It is an animal,” he said.

“AfriForum then goes and defends such people, it’s beyond animals, it’s cannibalism,” Mbalula added.

During his discussion about the issue, Mbalula also advocated that individuals accused of rape should not be entitled to bail.

Despite Pieterse being cleared of wrongdoing, Mbalula refused to apologise for his remarks about Pieterse.

In response, Pieterse filed charges of crimen injuria against Mbalula, EFF leader Julius Malema, and Eastern Cape Education MEC Fundile Gade.

Although the National Prosecuting Authority initially refused to prosecute this case, it has changed its mind under pressure from AfriForum’s Private Prosecution Unit.

ANC responds to the news

The ANC’s national spokesperson, Mahlengi Bhengu, slated the decision of the NPA to prosecute Fikile Mbalula.

“It is peculiar, irregular and potentially corrupt that a special interest political outfit, AfriForum, is the first conveyor of a decision by an institution of State,” she said.

“The blinding obsession with Mbalula that this special interest political formation has long held is bordering on harassment.”

She added that this activity was carried out by abusing state institutions to advance the nefarious political agendas of AfriForum, its funders, and enablers.

The ANC defended Mbalula, saying that the media statement followed the public identification of a suspect by the Minister of Police and SAPS.

“When the Minister acknowledged the identification was incorrect, the ANC acknowledged that correction publicly, through its National Spokesperson,” Bhengu said.

She added that this complaint was considered by independent prosecutors and closed for want of merit. “It was revived after representations by one side,” she said.

“AfriForum announced that a decision to prosecute had been taken. The ANC and the Secretary General are not aware of such a decision.”

“AfriForum must be called out for what it is, a racist organisation that has made a political project of attacking the ANC and resisting transformation,” she said.

“It peddles lies to deepen division, then wraps its campaigns in the language of justice. Justice that they had actively denied to black people under apartheid for years.”

Bhengu said that the attack on the ANC’s Secretary General belongs to that same political playbook.

“At each pivotal moment in the body politic, we are now always awaiting to see what AfriForum shall do to further its naked racist politics,” she said.

AfriForum longs for a country where black people are expected to bow their heads and answer, ‘Ja baas’. That country is gone, and the ANC will never allow it to return.”