Economic Freedom Fighters leader Julius Malema on Monday accused the SABC of censoring a live media conference when he voiced his opinion about the broadcaster’s former chief operating officer Hlaudi Motsoeneng.

Malema was speaking at a media briefing after the third EFF Plenum meeting held at the weekend.

Pulling no punches‚ he described the ANC as a party “where people with brains are sidelined”. He said the party leadership had become “cloudy” and referred to Motsoeneng as the “crème de la crème of the ANC”.

“There are no brains‚ they are gone and if there are no brains….” he said – and suddenly the feed disappeared.

Commentators were scathing on social media‚ accusing the state broadcaster of censorship.

@tdyani tweeted: “Guys look what happened on SABC’s news channel after Julius mentioned Hlaudi”

The EFF official account‚ @EFFSouthAfrica‚ relayed Malema’s reaction in a series of tweets.

“#Malema: we were live on SABC now but immediately when I spoke about Hlaudi we were cut off. That is the situation SA is in.”

“#Malema: SABC now has us back live because I exposed them. SABC is ours they must make peace with it. We will fight for it!‚” tweeted the red berets.

There was no immediate reaction from the SABC on what had transpired.