If we are hungry, Mantashe's child must also be: EFF's Sihle Lonzi
Speaking to supporters on Monday at the party's VAT victory march, Lonzi said the party won't tolerate ANC leaders' children being preferred for jobs over others.
'We don't have a problem with the children of ANC politicians and ministers. Our fight with them is not personal, but we have a problem with favouritism and nepotism,' he said.
Lonzi's statement came after a recent parliamentary portfolio committee meeting in which he questioned the department of higher education's appointment of Sector Education and Training Authority (Seta) board chairs.
The controversy surrounds Buyambo Mantashe, the son of ANC national chair Gwede Mantashe, who was listed as one of the Seta board chairs. After public outrage, the appointments were withdrawn.
The issue was escalated by the high number of unemployed youth in the country, with the unemployment rate increasing by a percentage point to reach 32.9% in the first quarter of the year. Lonzi argued that politicians' children should not be given preferential treatment when many young people are struggling to find jobs.
'We have a problem if the children of politicians jump the line when young people in South Africa are unemployed.
'If we are unemployed, even the child of Ramaphosa must be unemployed. If we are hungry, the child of Mantashe must also be hungry. If we don't have jobs, even the child of Mbalula must not get a job. We are tired of politicians eating while the youth of this country remain hungry.'
EFF leader Julius Malema has previously called for South Africans to be prioritised for jobs, regardless of language or connections.
'We don't want to know if you're a relative, we don't want to know which language you speak. If you're South African and qualified, get the job. That should be the position of the EFF councillor. We need to prioritise South Africans and our own constituency.'

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Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Advertisement Video Player is loading. Play Video Play Unmute Current Time 0:00 / Duration -:- Loaded : 0% Stream Type LIVE Seek to live, currently behind live LIVE Remaining Time - 0:00 This is a modal window. Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window. Text Color White Black Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Background Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Opaque Semi-Transparent Transparent Window Color Black White Red Green Blue Yellow Magenta Cyan Transparency Transparent Semi-Transparent Opaque Font Size 50% 75% 100% 125% 150% 175% 200% 300% 400% Text Edge Style None Raised Depressed Uniform Dropshadow Font Family Proportional Sans-Serif Monospace Sans-Serif Proportional Serif Monospace Serif Casual Script Small Caps Reset restore all settings to the default values Done Close Modal Dialog End of dialog window. Next Stay Close ✕ From the military regimes of Ayub Khan and Zia-ul-Haq to the more modern, media-savvy control strategies under Pervez Musharraf, the trend has remained the same — muzzle dissent and protect power. The Pakistan Electronic Media Regulatory Authority, formed in 2002, was meant to regulate broadcast media. 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Daily Maverick
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Sometimes the tides of politics will place one party in the majority and sometimes another. 'But it remains the duty of all councillors to facilitate and not obstruct the workings of the council. For councillors to continue to draw their salaries, while refusing to attend meetings and seeking thereby to stultify the working of a council would be a breach of their obligations as councillors. It is a breach of the Code of Conduct that binds all councillors and obliges them to attend all meetings of the council and of committees of which they are members.' Steyn warned that if Johnson refused to act, the DA would approach the Eastern Cape MEC of Cooperative Governance and Traditional Affairs, Zolile Williams, to intervene. 'The walkout staged by the members of the governing coalition in the meeting of 24 July raises grave concerns. Aside from the undemocratic actions of said individuals staging a walkout subsequent to a loss in the consideration of a motion, this action is legally [precluded],' Steyn wrote. He said that another ruling by the Gauteng Division of the High Court stated: '… the importance of serving in a municipal council is that party political affiliation and agendas are eschewed for the greater good of the communities served by those councils. … [E]very municipal councillor must comply with the constitutional injunction to municipalities, to prioritise the basic needs of local communities and to provide the basic minimum services to all members of such local communities.' Steyn said, 'These strong words of the [Gauteng] Judge President, together with the earlier strong remarks by the Constitutional Court, put to rest any debate about this issue. Walkouts are illegal. 'No matter how strongly a councillor disagrees with the proceedings in a meeting, there is no 'right to walk out', ' Steyn said. 'Councillors are expected (and paid) to attend council and committee meetings.' Walkout costs 'should be recovered' He said the wasted costs of the meeting should be recovered from the councillors involved. 'Such a walkout forces the municipality to convene another meeting. The municipality thus incurs fruitless and wasteful expenditure on a meeting that was entirely avoidable if everyone had simply obeyed the law. The municipal manager will be forced by law to recover these costs from the councillors [who] walked out and caused the meeting to collapse. 'The new powers of the Auditor-General have made this threat even more real than it was before. If the municipal manager does not make an effort to recover these costs from the councillors, the Auditor-General may come for the municipal manager and issue a certificate of debt to the municipal manager. 'So a diligent and careful municipal manager will not hesitate to recover the costs from the councillors, even if only to protect him or herself from individual liability. There could also be individual liability for the councillors who walked out,' Steyn said. Nqwazi's precautionary suspension Nqwazi was put on precautionary suspension in late 2023 and again in early 2024, pending disciplinary action which had been instituted against her. In his legal opinion, senior counsel Olav Ronaasen said he had been asked to advise on the viability of the disciplinary proceedings against Nqwazi and the status of the criminal proceedings against her to enable the council to reach an informed decision on whether it should persist with the disciplinary proceedings or withdraw them and continue to pursue a settlement with her, in terms of which her employment with the municipality would terminate. The National Treasury has refused to approve a departure which would allow a settlement to be paid, suggesting that the disciplinary proceedings should first be pursued to completion. But Ronaasen said in his analysis of the charges against Nqwazi, the disciplinary action was likely to fail as all the allegations against her neglected to take into account that she had been carrying out instructions from the city council. Lobishe has not responded to questions sent by Daily Maverick to her and the metro's director of communications. Despite weeks of pleas from business and civil society for improved service delivery and leadership stability, she has failed to explain her conduct on the city manager issue. The metro is facing a precarious time as tariffs imposed by President Donald Trump are set to come into operation on Friday. Nqwazi was arrested by the Hawks in September 2022, along with the metro's former human settlements director Norman Mapu, businessman Xolani Masela, his spouse Nwabisa, former Democratic Alliance councillors Trevor Louw, Neville Higgins and Victor Manyathi, and Nelson Mandela Bay ANC secretary Luyolo Nqakula. They face charges of corruption, money laundering, fraud and contravening the Municipal Finance Management Act. It is alleged that kickbacks for a toilet tender awarded during the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic were used to reward Louw, Higgins and Manyathi for voting for a motion of no confidence against former DA mayor Athol Trollip. However, an application is pending for Nqwazi to be discharged after the close of the State's case, with her legal team arguing that the State had failed to lead any evidence against her. DM